Latin America registered, in the second quarter of 2025, its 11th consecutive period of growth in mass goods consumption, with a 1.61% increase in volume. Despite the positive performance, only 4.11% of branded products managed to win new sales occasions – the lowest rate recorded in the last five years. This is according to the new edition of the 2025 Consumer Insights study, produced by Worldpanel by Numerator.
This duality reflects the current consumption landscape in the region. The Latin American shopping basket has become more fragmented, with consumers exploring more channels (an average of 9.5 per year) and more brands (97 different ones), but with lower purchase frequency – 80% categories saw a drop in this indicator.
Concerning channels, e-commerce, discount stores, and wholesalers are the only formats supporting growth in frequency, with increases of 9%, 8%, and 4%, respectively. Together, they added 500 million additional purchase occasions compared to the previous year. The traditional channel, on the other hand, was primarily responsible for the decline, with a decrease of 14%.
Brands Hovedstrøm...inclusive, foram as mais impactadas por este novo comportamento do consumidor, com recuo de 5,61 TP3T na frequência de compra e de 31 TP3T no número de unidades por cliente. Em contrapartida, as opções... premio E le stesse hanno registrato un aumento sia di frequenza (0,91 TP3T e 1,41 TP3T, rispettivamente) che di volume (41 TP3T e 91 TP3T).
The study shows that 95% of the brands that grew in volume did so by gaining presence in households – which reaffirms the importance of reaching new buyers as the main lever for growth. However, the combination of presence in households and frequency proved to be the most efficient strategy, as 50% of the companies that grew for two consecutive years adopted this strategy," highlights Marcela Botana, Director of Market Development for Latin America at Worldpanel by Numerator.
It is still important to highlight that Latin American consumer behavior shows greater openness to experimentation. More than 90% of categories gained presence in homes in 2025, even with the trend of decreased repeat purchasing. Growth is more concentrated in non-essential categories (81%), but also reaches essential categories (70%), indicating that there is room for expansion even in already established markets.
The quarterly Consumer Insights report continuously monitors the consumption behavior of Latin Americans, focusing on the food, beverage, cleaning products, and personal care segments. The second quarter 2025 edition includes data from nine markets: Central America (Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama and the Dominican Republic), Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Mexico, and Peru.
