Premium Biscuits Gaining Currency

Indias bakery market is estimated to be worth Rs.16500 crore and it is growing impressively at 7.5 percent per annum.

- Swarnendu Biswas

Biscuits and breads comprise the major segment of India’s bakery industry, accounting for 82 percent of all bakery production in the country. It indicates that though the Indian bakery industry has of late been flooded with fashionable lifestyle products like croissants, muffins, designer cakes and high-end chocolates, it is still predominantly need-based.

Though of imported origin, over the years, breads and biscuits have graduated to become the needs of middle income and even lower middle income households in urban India. Biscuits became an integral part of India’s snacking habits during the latter half of the last century, and today India is the third largest producer of biscuits in the world, with only the US and China ahead of us in this regard. The immense role of biscuits and cookies in time-starved post-modern India’s snacking options cannot be overlooked.

Today biscuits have high acceptance in India, across a gamut of socio-economic and demographic profiles and has significant penetration in rural India too. India is the largest biscuit consuming nation in the world. Most of the biscuit and cookie consumption in the country takes place in the east and north India.

Portending Impressive Growth

And the biscuit market in India is only expected to increase in the near future. According to a TechSci Research’s report titled ‘India Biscuit Market by Product Type (Plain Biscuit, Cookie, Sandwich Biscuit, Center Filled Biscuit & Others), By Sales Channel (Supermarket/Hypermarket, Convenience Store & Others), Competition Forecast & Opportunities, 2012 – 2022,’ India’s biscuit market stood at 3.9 billion USD in 2016, and was projected to grow at a CAGR of 11.27 percent in value terms, during 2017-2022, to reach 7.25 billion USD by 2022. The report was published in July 2017.