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One of the most notable trends we’ve observed in buying habits is the move towards poison-free solutions for pest control. We’ve been working hard in recent years to respond to this shift in consumer behaviour and 86% of our products are now entirely poison-free.
It’s also notable that more consumers are seeking completely non-lethal ways of ridding their homes of pests. There were more than 10 million uses of pest control products last year and 67% of those were non-lethal methods. We expect this trend to continue and our new product innovation pipeline is dedicated to finding more non-lethal and poison free product solutions.
The lockdowns of 2020 and 2021 saw a marked increase in demand for rodent control products and more than a 70% increase in sightings. Because we all spent more time at home during the day, there was more opportunity to observe rats going about their daily business. Pubs and restaurants were closed, so there was less rubbish and litter – and the rats seem to have moved in to people’s homes and gardens in search of alternative sources of food.
We’ve also noticed an increase in consumers seeking ways to control larger animals and birds in their gardens. Again, this is possibly driven partly by families spending more time outside at home whilst they have been unable to go to work or school, or travel away on holiday so easily. We have built our new vertebrate control range of products to respond to this emerging trend, making it easy to find welfare-friendly ways of eliminating unwelcome birds and mammals – including pigeons, cats, dogs, foxes and rabbits - from the garden.
Much of the recent increase in consumer activity took place online, and a large proportion of the sales growth we experienced came from our web customers. We now know that over half of all DIY pest control sales begin with an online search. This is a trend we are determined to develop on behalf of all our customers – not just those with sophisticated e-commerce solutions. Our new The Big Cheese Webstore presents a huge opportunity for our retail partners to benefit from a dedicated e-commerce solution with local exclusivity – driving footfall and providing exemplary customer service through additional home delivery or click & collect options.
At STV we have many years of experience of the pest control category, and we recognise that our retail partners don’t always have the time or opportunity to review market information in detail or keep up with the latest consumer demands. So, we provide our ‘Top100’ which clearly defines the top selling lines to ensure our retail partners always have the optimum range listing to meet consumer needs.
We’ve recently gone one step further with the Top100 and can now supply a fully interactive merchandising solution too. Not only does the merchandising clearly segment the products to make selection simpler, it also has an interactive NFC code built in to the POS. This means consumers can quickly and easily access our new The Big Cheese Webstore online product selector – no more than three clicks direct the customer to their ideal product solution.
We’re confident that this major new investment – more than £0.5million in 2021/22 - will not only help consumers overcome their lack of confidence in choosing the right product, but it will also support our retail partners to maximise the sales potential from this rapidly growing category. We’ve identified a need for better information that is easy to access and understand. That’s one of the main drivers for our series of informative and engaging video ‘shorts’ featuring a wide range of out Top100 lines. Each video features a user explaining their experience of the product and how they achieved the best results. They’re all accessible on TBCandme.com and they can also be reached directly from the product packaging at the point of sale. All the featured products have a unique QR code on the pack which links to the relevant video and then in to the website where consumers will find lots more useful information, including our ‘select-a-pest’ tool which means consumers are never more than 3 clicks away from finding their ideal pest control solution.
The market for DIY Pest Control is growing strongly and we know that the majority of consumers go first to their laptop, phone or tablet for advice. It’s also true that the sales of DIY Pest control through online retailers have been growing much more strongly than traditional bricks and mortar retailers. Our strategy at STV is to make sure traditional retailers can also benefit from the strong category growth in DIY Pest Control. That’s why we’ve developed TBCandme.com and invested heavily in digital content to capture consumers at the start of their purchase journey. We need traditional retail partners to join us to ensure that consumers can easily access the product they identify online – and keep them shopping with their trusted, local retailer. I’d love to hear from any retailer who would like to know more about this exciting new way to retail DIY Pest Control and to benefit directly from the latest shopping trends.
