Why Private Label Has a Bigger Role in Edible Grocery Than Household Essentials

In 2026, private label is one of the supermarket industry’s most important competitive tools. But its success is hardly uniform across the store. In edible grocery, store brands have established a substantial presence. In household essentials, national brands remain much more firmly entrenched.

We’ve published regional brand rankings for the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast for years, and I’ve been struck by the difference in the competitive positions of private label and national brands across these departments.

The latest rankings provide some revealing examples.

In the Baltimore/Washington market, private-label snack nuts and fresh bread occupy the top two positions in General Food dollar sales rankings. Private-label refrigerated white milk, fresh eggs, refrigerated uncooked meats (excluding poultry) and shredded natural cheese hold the first four positions in Refrigerated.

Household Essentials looks very different. Tide liquid detergents, Tide unit-dose detergents, Cascade dishwasher detergents, Dawn manual dish detergents and Gain liquid detergents occupy the first five positions.

Those rankings come from Circana OmniMarket Total Store View, for the latest 52-week period ending September 6, 2026, in the Baltimore, MD/Washington DC multi outlet+ market, as reported by Circana, a Chicago-based market research firm.

The rankings are based on dollar sales within Circana’s specified product classifications. They don’t represent department-wide market shares, and the distinction between departments should by no means be interpreted as a calculated private-label penetration gap.

All the same, I think the contrast deserves a hard look; it reflects several important differences in consumer behavior, purchasing frequency, product performance, advertising and brand loyalty. And for those in the grocery business, those differences should influence how aggressively they expand private label and how much shelf space they devote to it.

Purchase Frequency Gives Food an Advantage

One of the most important reasons private label performs well in edible grocery is also one of the simplest: people buy food constantly.

A household might purchase milk, bread, produce, meat, dairy products and snacks several times a week. Each shopping trip presents another opportunity to compare prices, respond to promotions or try something different.

Imagine a shopper who has always purchased a national-brand pasta sauce. One week, the store brand is on promotion. The shopper tries it, finds it’s just fine and buys it again the following week. After a while, the store brand becomes the go-to choice. 

The upshot is the national manufacturer may have lost a customer without the retailer having to do much more than offer a competitive product at an attractive price.

Of course, household essentials operate on a different purchasing cycle.

A bottle of laundry detergent might last six weeks. Trash bags, cleaning supplies and batteries can last considerably longer. Consumers have fewer opportunities to experiment, and retailers have fewer opportunities to persuade them to switch.

A food product purchased weekly can establish consumer confidence relatively quickly. It might take months for a detergent purchased every six weeks to notch the same number of successful trials.

Frequent purchasing also helps establish habits. National brands have traditionally benefited from habitual purchasing, but retailers can develop the same loyalty when their products consistently meet expectations.

With all that said, purchase frequency doesn’t explain everything. Some food categories have exceptionally loyal national-brand customers, and some household categories have successful private-label programs. But the greater number of purchasing occasions in edible grocery categories gives retailers a big advantage there.

Product Performance Protects Established Brands

Then there’s the other side of the coin: Consumers also consider what happens if an unfamiliar product disappoints them.

In many edible categories, the consequences of switching brands are relatively minor. A shopper who dislikes whatever food product can return to the preferred national brand on the next shopping trip.

And consumers are accustomed to shopping food categories on price. As we’ve seen, brands have a lot less potency here than they used to. Shoppers compare promotions, package sizes and brands regularly, particularly when they believe the products are reasonably interchangeable.

Again, household products are different; they have to accomplish goals, complete tasks.

Laundry detergent has to remove stains without damaging clothing. Dishwasher detergent must clean effectively. Paper towels need only absorb spills without falling apart, and so on.

Consumers who have found products that work are understandably reluctant to take chances.

I’ve always thought this was one of the more underappreciated advantages enjoyed by household brands. They aren’t simply selling detergent or paper towels; they’re selling confidence that the product will do its job.

Advertising Has Built Enormous Brand Power

Advertising is another key piece of the puzzle. It’s been a potent force for decades – longer, in a lot of cases. 

Procter & Gamble is probably the best example. P&G reported approximately $9.2 billion in advertising expenses during fiscal 2025 across its portfolio of household, personal-care and other consumer brands.

I’ve spent enough years in the grocery industry to appreciate just how much brand power P&G has accumulated. Few manufacturers have been as effective at convincing consumers that their products are worth a premium price.

The Circana Household Essentials rankings tell the tale. In the Baltimore/Washington market, P&G brands Tide, Cascade, Dawn, Gain and Downy occupy six of the top positions in the reported dollar sales rankings.

Six positions – that’s a powerful competitive position, although the rankings themselves don’t establish how much of it is attributable to advertising.

Successful products generate resources for continued advertising, product development and promotional activity. Those investments reinforce consumer confidence and help manufacturers defend their market positions.

Food manufacturers certainly spend heavily on advertising, too. Major beverage, snack, cereal and packaged-food companies have built some of the most recognizable brands in the world.

But then again, advertising interacts with consumer behavior differently across categories.

In food, shoppers often have frequent opportunities to try competing products. In household essentials, established performance expectations and longer purchasing cycles can make brand preferences more difficult to dislodge.

I wouldn’t attribute the difference entirely to advertising. Product quality, innovation, distribution and pricing all contribute to brand strength. But decades of sustained marketing investment have given national manufacturers a formidable advantage in many household categories.

Supermarkets Have Their Own Marketing Advantage

National manufacturers have to build demand across multiple retailers and distribution channels. Supermarkets, discounters, and clubs already have direct access to the people shopping in their stores.

That’s a powerful advantage.

Retailers control shelf placement, product assortment, promotional displays, weekly circulars, digital coupons, loyalty offers and online merchandising. They can put a store-brand product directly beside a national brand, establish an attractive price difference and encourage customers to compare the two.

As of 2026, retailers can also use loyalty-program data and retail-media networks to identify purchasing patterns and target promotions more precisely.

A retailer doesn’t necessarily have to convince consumers across the country to purchase its store brand. It has only to convince the customers already shopping in its stores.

Of course, private label isn’t free to develop or promote, and retailers still have to pay for product development, packaging, sourcing, quality assurance and merchandising support. But they can coordinate those investments with their existing operations and customer relationships rather than relying on the nationwide advertising model used by major manufacturers.

Private-Label Quality Has Improved Considerably

The old image of private label as a cheap, inferior substitute is outdated.

Retailers have backed their private-label ambitions with sizable investments in manufacturing and product development. For instance, Walmart has invested more than $700 million in two milk-processing facilities in Georgia and Texas, while Kroger poured $70 million in an Ohio dairy-processing expansion. Walmart is also redesigning nearly 10,000 Great Value products. Numbers like that put a point on private label’s evolution into a major strategic investment.

Besides, many store-brand products are produced by established private-label manufacturers. And it’s no secret that some suppliers manufacture both national-brand and retailer-owned products, occasionally using similar technologies or production facilities. To be clear, that doesn’t make the finished products identical. Ingredients, formulations and quality specifications can differ even when products come from the same manufacturer.

Still, I think it’s fair to say that the “quality gap” consumers once associated with private label has narrowed considerably in many edible categories.

Retailers have also become much more sophisticated about positioning their products.

Instead of offering one inexpensive alternative, plenty now maintain several private-label tiers, including value products, mainstream store brands, premium selections, organic foods and specialty items. This gives retailers the ability to compete on more than price. They can develop exclusive products, serve different customer segments and build an identity that competitors cannot duplicate.

The Circana rankings provide a useful indication of how just broadly private label participates in food categories. In the Baltimore/Washington Refrigerated rankings, store brands lead in refrigerated white milk, fresh eggs, refrigerated uncooked meats (excluding poultry), shredded natural cheese and refrigerated butter.

These are familiar, frequently purchased categories in which consumers have long accepted retailer-owned products.

Private Label Makes Price Comparisons More Difficult

There’s another advantage to private label that I suspect retailers appreciate more than they publicly acknowledge: It makes direct price comparisons between competing supermarkets more difficult.

A can of Campbell’s soup is the same product regardless of which retailer sells it – assuming the package size and variety are identical. So consumers can compare those prices directly.

A retailer’s private-label soup may have a different recipe, ingredient profile, package size or quality specification from a competing supermarket’s store brand. Consumers can still compare prices and unit costs, but they aren’t necessarily comparing identical products.

That gives retailers greater flexibility in pricing and merchandising.

It also makes private label useful for differentiating one supermarket from another. A successful store-brand product becomes something customers associate with that particular retailer.

There can be a financial advantage as well.

Private-label products may generate higher gross margins than comparable national brands, depending on sourcing costs, promotional spending, sales volume and other category economics.

But higher margins on individual items don’t necessarily translate into greater category profitability. Retailers still need to consider the sales and promotional contributions of national brands, as well as the risk of disappointing customers who expect to find them.

Private label works best when it strengthens the overall category rather than merely shifting sales from one product to another.

Inflation Has Driven Consumers to Experiment

The inflationary environment of the post-pandemic years has given private label yet another opportunity.

Consumers who previously purchased familiar national brands without much thought have become more attentive to price differences.

When a store-brand product offers comparable quality at a meaningful discount, the incentive to try it becomes stronger. And once a consumer discovers that a less expensive product meets expectations, the change sticks.

That’s one of the more significant challenges facing national manufacturers. Winning back a customer who has successfully switched to private label can demand a lot of promotional or innovative firepower. 

That said, inflation doesn’t guarantee lasting gains for store brands.

National manufacturers can respond with promotions, pricing adjustments and new products. Some consumers may also return to familiar brands when their financial circumstances improve. The lasting advantage belongs to private-label products that satisfy consumers after the initial price-driven purchase.

Household Essentials Call for a Different Strategy

I don’t believe retailers should interpret the strength of national brands in household essentials as a reason to retreat from private label in those categories, but they do need to recognize the investment required to encourage consumers to switch may be greater.

A lower shelf price might persuade someone to try a store-brand canned vegetable, but it may not be sufficient to convince that same shopper to abandon a laundry detergent they’ve trusted for years.

In performance-sensitive categories, retailers may need stronger quality claims, independent product testing, customer reviews, satisfaction guarantees and targeted introductory promotions.

They also need to distinguish among household categories. Paper towels, food-storage bags, cleaning supplies, laundry detergents, batteries and personal-care products have different purchasing patterns and consumer expectations.

Treating household essentials as a kind of private-label monolith overlooks these differences.

The better approach is to identify categories where consumers are receptive to alternatives and where retailers can offer a credible product advantage.

Shelf Space Is the Real Merchandising Decision

Ultimately, this analysis comes down to a decision every retailer has to make: how much shelf space should private label receive?

I think retailers sometimes place too much emphasis on increasing private-label penetration without giving equal consideration to total category performance.

A higher store-brand share is not automatically a better result.

If expanding private label reduces category sales, weakens assortment appeal or drives customers elsewhere for national brands they want, the retailer may have gained share without improving the business.

Shelf allocation should reflect purchase frequency, consumer loyalty, product performance, price differences, gross margins and overall category profitability. Retailers also need to measure shelf productivity. Additional private-label facings should generate sufficient sales and profit to justify replacing national-brand products.

At the same time, national brands contribute more than their individual margins. They attract customers, support promotions, introduce innovations and help establish a supermarket’s competitive position.

The appropriate balance is going to vary – in some cases considerably – by category.

Where Private Label Can Grow Next

I see continued opportunities for private-label expansion in edible grocery, particularly through improved product quality, premium assortments, specialty foods and categories where retailers can offer meaningful differentiation.

The existing foundation is strong. Consumers are familiar with store brands, purchasing occasions are frequent and manufacturers have developed sophisticated capabilities to support retailer-owned products.

Household essentials present opportunities as well, but I would expect growth to be more selective. Retailers should concentrate on categories where performance can be demonstrated, price differences are meaningful and consumers are willing to reconsider established brand preferences.

All the same, there’s no reason to assume household essentials will eventually achieve the same private-label penetration as edible grocery. The underlying economics and purchasing behavior are too different.

For supermarket executives, the objective should be to build private-label programs that improve category profitability, reinforce the retailer’s value proposition and strengthen customer loyalty. And I’d put particular emphasis on the shelf-space decision. Retailers need to understand not only where private label can gain market share, but whether giving it additional space produces a better financial result than the national brands it replaces.