Sales in many cleaning product categories have increased substantially in the past 2 months due to coronavirus health concerns – and this was before ‘stay home’ measures were introduced, along with the concomitant boredom and hypersensitivity to one’s home environment this induces. According to Statista US data from mid-March, sales of aerosol disinfectants in the US were up nearly 400 percent in March versus same time last year. Bath and shower wipes were up 180 percent, and multipurpose cleaners 148 percent.
Online on eBay, we are seeing similar trends looking across Australia, the US, and the UK for a number of household cleaning categories, albeit that some of the top-selling product formats vary by market. In most categories, the majority of what is listed and sold are unbranded generics, with some notable exceptions.
DISINFECTANT GOES OFF … THE CHARTS
The scarcity of hand sanitiser has become a new normal, at least in Australia, with Dettol seeing sales increase by 600 percent as far back as mid-February, according to 10Daily.
Online in cleaning products, it’s no different. The largest-selling cleaning product subcategory by some order of magnitude, the most popular products in this subcategory on eBay in March were hospital-grade disinfectant with the top 50 listings selling over 3000 units per week, and alcohol isopropanol (2800+ units/week) which can be used as a hand sanitiser. It should be noted that eBay banned sales of hand sanitiser and some other categories such as face masks in early March to prevent some sellers price gouging.
The top-selling products on eBay in the US are also disinfectants particularly aerosol sprays, most of which are unbranded although Lysol air spray and Windex antibacterial spray rate a mention. The other interesting category in the US is washing machine antibacterial tablets, which although the top 50 listings only move 337 units per week versus disinfectant’s nearly 5000 units, is one of the top movers.
Disinfectants saw a significant upswing in March versus February. In Australia online volumes increased by a factor of 14, in the UK by a factor of 10, and in the US a staggering 30 times as many units were sold in March as February.
THE GLOVES ARE ON …
Another category seeing huge increases is cleaning gloves, given their relationship to hand sanitation. All three markets saw significant spikes in March, increasing as the month wore on. Of the subcategories we reviewed, this was the second-largest selling category in units per week with the top 50 listings, selling nearly all generics, moving 421 units per week in Australia, 594 units per week in the US and 655 units per week in the UK. It appears Americans are more into sprays and the Brits more into gloves, although interestingly Australia had 2/3 the number of gloves listings as the UK (and 40 percent of the number of US listings).
… BUT NOT TO USE CLEANING TOWELS AND CLOTHS
This category has remained reasonably flat in the past 3 months albeit with a modest increase in the UK. Again there is an abundance of listings in Australia, with 2/3 of the number of those in the UK, and over half those of the US. Top selling products in Australia are microfiber cloths, with the top 50 listings selling 180 units per week, followed by wipes at 29 per week with both Chux and Scotts rating a mention. In the US unbranded microfibre cloths dominate at 568 units per week for the top sellers, followed by Norwex enviro at 105 units per week. In the UK microfibre cloths also dominate, with 511 units sold per week for the top sellers.
It should be noted that microfibre cloths may also be used for car cleaning, although with ‘stay at home’ restrictions now largely in place in all three markets we anticipate the need to clean cars will reduce somewhat in the immediate term.
SPONGES AND SCOURERS: MAGIC ERASER DOMINATES
Similar to cleaning cloths, sponges and scourers has not seen the same level of activity as other subcategories albeit that in Australia, the top 50 listings for Magic Eraser sells a respectable 195 units per week, silicon scrubbers 139 units per week and spin brushes (for tile grout) 69 units per week. Magic Eraser is also a top seller in both the US and UK at 295 units per week and 381 units per week respectively versus generic scrubbers at 111 and 66 units per week respectively.
MOPS FLATTEN IN AU BUT GROW OVERSEAS
Mops was the only cleaning category we reviewed where the overall trend was different in Australia to that of the US or UK. Despite an abundance of listings – nearly as many as the UK and one third that of the US - in Australia, online mop sales peaked in January. We suspect this was due to the ash caused by the bushfires. Whilst remaining reasonably high, subcategory sales have declined since. The top selling products online in Australia in March were polishers and slipper (shoe-style) mops, and Magic mop at 31, 90 and 54 units per week respectively. Regular flat mops barely rated. Where in the US, where mop sales have increased in the past 3 months, flat mops were the number two seller at 181 units per week, (Magic mops being number one at 232 units per week), and steam mops coming in third. In the UK it was a similar story with Magic mops at number one (182 units per week) and flat mops at number two (109 units per week).
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Australia, US and UK eBay data sourced by ShelfTrend as at March 28, 2020.
*All units per week data are the combined total of the Top 50 listings for that category for an individual market.