During World of Wipes, Svetlana Uduslivaia, head of Research at Euromonitor International, lectured on the global market for personal care wipes, with a focus on adult care wipes.

Talking about the adult incontinence category as a whole, Uduslivaia notes in 2020, the market tracker continues to see the uptake in demand in retail adult incontinence, which led to the strong category performance on the already positive trend globally in retail.

Euromonitor’s most recent quarterly update released in late July does show somewhat slower growth, but still healthy growth, for the adult incontinence category in 2020 and going forward primarily because of the impact on the economies, consumers household incomes, depressed incomes and high levels of unemployment, Uduslivaia says. “If we are to take into account the Covid-19 impact and further potential recessionary trends that might impact the category even further,” she adds.

As far as wipes, Euromonitor continues to see a spike in demand for personal care wipes as consumers are increasing their hygiene routine at home, and as a result many categories have been benefitting through this. “However, if Covid-19 economic fallout continues along recessionary trends and we continue to see household incomes affected by those macroeconomic trends then we are likely to see downward pressure on the category, households will be evaluating their spending priorities and will have to pull back or look for more affordable options,” she says.

According to Uduslivaia, adult incontinence and wipes are two categories of disposable hygiene that require already fairly sizable and stable per capita disposable income for consumers or households to enter the categories. She then touched on income thresholds for consumers to enter these categories. Developed markets, she said, are well above these thresholds, but many developing markets are still facing challenges when it comes to adult incontinence consumption and wipes consumption. Two countries she referenced were China and India, where Chinese and Indian income levels show a big difference. “In China the income levels are gradually allowing categories to develop and grow, while India still falls far behind in terms of incomes, posing challenges for the category growth driving household consumption of these products and also problems of balancing affordability with the need for profit margins.”

According to Euromonitor, there is nearly USD$10 billion in estimated untapped potential in both retail adult incontinence products and in personal care wipes. “That is a lot to consider when we talk about organic growth, when we talk about incremental sales, and when we talk about long term potential and growth,” Uduslivaia says.

Looking at personal care wipes in particular, the current segmentation focuses a lot on baby, cosmetics, and some other wipes categories. “But there are wider opportunities that exist within adult care wipes, in retail in particular, and that’s beyond current online, heavily skewed access via online channels and beyond the institutional channels,” she adds. “Typically we know that adult incontinence and instances of adult incontinence increase with age. However as the awareness of incontinence as a condition has been on the rise, we’re looking at younger age groups looking at adult incontinence, engaging with brands in the industry and looking for more information. So there is certain potential there to establish that communication earlier to increase the awareness and to drive consumption of retail adult incontinence products including adult care wipes.”

Meanwhile, in discussing consumer needs and wants in adult care wipes, Uduslivaia touched on several points. First is that wipe sheet size matters, especially when adult care wipes are used for the purpose it initially was designed. Another focus for consumers is moisture, “Too much moisture or too little moisture—it has to be just right,” she reports.

According to Euromonitor, consumers using adult care wipes also typically criticize heavily scented wipes. Uduslivaia notes some consumers say scents can be too overpowering, but in some cases they’re concerned about allergies—either their own allergies or the allergies of people they’re taking care of. Other consumer concerns she touched on deal with wipe thickness, price, packaging and flushability.

This presentation, along with all World of Wipes presentations, will be available for viewing over the next 12 months.