Asian Trader: How important is convenience to your products and how does your sales and merchandising there differ from other channels?
Matt Boulter: Convenience is the most impulse-driven channel we sell into. Shoppers typically spend a couple of minutes in a convenience store, and most gum and confectionery purchases are quick decisions made at or near the counter.
The consumer need is what makes this channel different. We describe it as “little and often”; frequent, fast, smaller top-ups where the shopper wants to navigate the fixture effortlessly. What we take to independent retailers is not a scaled-down version of what we take to the multiples. It is a tighter range, weighted to the bestsellers, sited where people naturally walk. Singles, small sharing and price-marked packs do most of the work, where large sharing and boxed gifting carry more weight elsewhere. Shoppers are focused on value and looking for price reassurance, which is exactly what a price-marked pack delivers.
Independents do not have a category manager, so we try to be one. The Your Mars 24/7 app carries top-selling planograms, POS ordering and snacking insights, and we produce seasonal guides such as “Hop To It” at Easter.
AT: What would be your advice to independent retailers to maximise their confectionery sales, and what are your evergreen merchandising tips for the varied categories you manage?
MB: Availability of core bestsellers will do more than breadth of range. Our field team's most common sight is a bestseller gap next to products that sell through once a fortnight. Fill the gaps daily, then think about extending. Then, maximise your transaction zone. Keep the till area clutter-free, brand-block the main fixture, and put your best sellers in the most visible positions.
Seeing gum in store is the single biggest conversion trigger1, and shoppers expect to find it in more than three places on their way round a store. Till point is non-negotiable*, with a second and third sighting near food-to-go or the door.
Group chocolate by format – singles, small sharing, large sharing and boxed. Top sellers at eye level, and dual-site singles at the counter. Put bags of fruity confectionery alongside chocolate sharing, and both again by soft drinks for the evening trade.
AT: How would you sum up the state of the confectionery market? What have been the main changes you have observed since taking up the job in 2021?
MB: Confectionery was one of the strongest performing categories within packaged snacking last year, with value sales up 6.6 per cent against total packaged snacking at 4.6 per cent2. Only fruit snacks and ice cream grew faster. Mars Wrigley came in ahead of that again at 7.8 per cent value and 2.8 per cent units³, so the growth is coming from volume, not just price.
When I took this job in 2021, confectionery was still largely thought of as its own aisle. The boundaries between snacking categories have since dissolved. Consumers no longer think “I'm buying chocolate”; they think “I fancy a snack”, and that could be a chocolate bar, a milkshake or a savoury impulse line. We are competing for the same need across a much wider set of aisles.
Smaller formats at a lower price point let people treat themselves for less, while larger packs such as our 1kg M&M'S bags offer a high piece count for the spend. Mid-size packs still account for the bulk of sales, but growth is in the extremes.
Regulation is the other big change. Location restrictions arrived in 2022, and from 5 January this year we have had a 9pm television watershed and a ban on paid online advertising for HFSS products. Investment has moved into brand-level campaigns, in-store activation and retail media.
AT: How do you see the confectionery market evolving over the next few years? Are brands becoming more important, given an ageing demographic looking for nostalgia and an increasing tendency to go for premium products?
MB: In economic uncertainty, shoppers become risk-averse and go to brands they trust, and that is most visible at the seasons. People trade down when buying for themselves but do not when buying for someone else.
On premium, I would say not necessarily more premium. Chocolate is a tiered category and always has been. What has changed is how hard perceived value has to work at every tier, because raw material and operating costs continue to rise and pricing has moved with them. Christmas 2025 showed this in action. Shoppers did not choose between value and premium; they bought both, with affordable standard Advent calendars gaining share while trade-up NPD drove category value3.
Nostalgia is doing well for us, and I would put it down to emotion more than age. Bringing Opal Fruits back in the original flavours worked both for people who remember them and for younger shoppers drawn to an era they never experienced. MALTESERS turned 90 this year and is still one of the most-loved confectionery brands in the country. In a category obsessed with the next big thing, we are betting on timelessness.
AT: Do you see the importance of occasion growing in terms of sales, and if so, what other opportunities might arise for confectionery in the future?
MB: Christmas is the most important season for us by far, but 2025 was a cautious one. Total confectionery value grew just 0.6 per cent and units declined, with around one in three shoppers planning to spend less⁵. However, Mars Wrigley was the only manufacturer to grow both value at 4.2 per cent, and volume at 0.9 per cent⁵, contributing £7.3m in incremental category value4.
Easter comes next, and the last-minute mission plays most strongly into convenience. Small sharing is the segment to watch, now worth 25 per cent of total Easter sales and growing at 10.5 per cent since 20225. Halloween is no longer just trick-or-treat, and tins and tubs play a crossover role that carries shoppers straight into Christmas.
Beyond those, mini seasons are creating more frequency through the year. Close to four million people in the UK are Muslim6, which makes Ramadan and Eid significant moments for the category, and occasions such as a gift for a teacher are becoming more meaningful, too.
AT: NPD is always vibrant in confectionery. What sort of new products are upcoming, now we can have all chocolate bars in ice cream and ice lollies, for example? Are there other hybrids or new combinations across categories that you think might arise?
MB: NPD is the heartbeat of our growth strategy.
TWIX Hazelnut is our most exciting flavour innovation for the brand in years, and previous flavour variants brought an additional 512,000 shoppers into the brand7. M&M'S Cookie Dough is now a permanent fixture in the core range, and in April EXTRA moved beyond freshening breath with EXTRA PLUS.
This Christmas we have three launches, each built around a shopper the category is not quite reaching: Crispy M&M'S Mini Santas for the early window, the SNICKERS & Friends Selection Box for male gifters, and MALTESERS White Box for under-35s, who over-index in white chocolate8.
AT: GLP-1s are increasingly stopping people eating between meals, and even stopping them eating at mealtimes. How are you positioning, or repositioning, your brands in this environment, or do you not see any effects or future challenges? Will treats and taste survive the induced reduction of appetite?
MB: It is still early days in understanding the real market impact. We monitor consumer trends closely, but the picture is not settled.
What we are confident about is that people will still want to treat themselves. Even when budgets – and appetites – are squeezed, shoppers are unwilling to give up small, mood-boosting moments, and that instinct does not disappear because appetite changes. This has led to a consumer need for smaller portion sizes; a trend we were seeing well before GLP-1 medications entered the market.
Our response is pack size rather than reformulation. Our experience is that consumers want the real thing and are not prepared to eat a reformulated version, so we have grown the range of sizes instead. For retailers, that means keeping both ends of the size range on shelf; the middle does not cover everybody.
AT: What are the biggest challenges in the confectionery sector right now? Is it extreme volatility and record-high costs for raw materials such as cocoa, or perhaps strict health regulations, the ongoing cost-of-living squeeze or health and lifestyle shifts?
MB: Chocolate has seen greater inflation than the rest of the category due to cocoa pricing. Consumers are still making choices about what goes in the basket to a degree they did not have to before. Some have traded up to bigger formats that offer better value, some are driven by unit price, and our job is to have something for both. What we will not do is compromise on quality or taste. Some recipes in the market are changing; that is not something we are looking to do, and pricing remains at the sole discretion of the retailer.
Since 5 January, we have had a 9pm television watershed and a ban on paid online advertising for HFSS products, which removes a lot of the reach that used to build a season. At the same time, the transaction zone is shrinking as more stores move to self-service. Both put more pressure on what happens in store. Cost-of-living is the third, and it shows up as a hyper-focus on value, which is why clear pricing and price-marked packs are essential.
AT: Do you have any advice for independent retailers to make the most of their confectionery aisle? How would you advise them to adapt to upcoming sales and to take advantage of this approaching Golden Quarter, which we like to think is heralded by Diwali?
MB: Diwali falls on 8 November this year, just after Halloween, and then we go straight into Christmas. Plan the space now and consider what products you will stock for each season. The most common mistake is waiting until an event is a few weeks away, which misses the early-season treating phase. For example, August to October accounts for £381m of seasonal confectionery sales, outperforming November9.
Place self-eat seasonal treats at impulse zones for the early spontaneous buy, and larger gifting formats, selection boxes and tubs on visible gondola ends. The Your Mars 24/7 app has seasonal planograms and POS to order. And do not under-stock the final 48 hours; turning away last-minute shoppers is the most profitable trade you can miss.
AT: Can you say a little about your brands, how they are performing and what you have planned for them in terms of campaigns or NPD?
MB: Mars Wrigley grew value sales 7.8 per cent and units 2.8 per cent last year, ahead of a category growing at 6.6 per cent³, and we were the fastest-growing manufacturer in singles and small sharing¹².
MALTESERS turns 90 this year and is a brand we build a lot of our seasonal and gifting activity around. MALTESERS White Box gives us a second entry point into everyday boxed chocolate this Christmas.
M&M'S has been our biggest recruiter. M&M'S Cookie Dough has reached 4.3 per cent penetration10 and sold more than 4.4 million units11, and M&M'S Minis Funsize is our hero for the season, supported by a campaign built around our partnership with Disneyland Paris.
In gum, EXTRA PLUS launched in April as a three-strong sugar-free, HFSS-compliant range, backed by EXTRA's biggest-ever innovation media investment. The aim is to increase penetration; around 30 per cent of UK consumers chew, against 98 per cent who eat chocolate12.
AT: Based on your experience of selling into various channels, how do you think impulse will fare in the future?
MB: Self-service and self-scan have shortened the time a shopper spends in the transaction zone, and that is where a lot of gum and singles were sold. Our response is a strategy built around the transaction zone in its widest sense, on the insight that shoppers expect to see gum in more than three locations on their way round a store.
Confectionery is an emotional purchase, and it is triggered by seeing the product². If a shopper does not see it, it does not exist to them, so the answer is more sitings. Independents have a real advantage here, as you can put product where you want it, react in a day, and you are not waiting on a national planogram reset. That is the biggest difference I see between the channels.
* Subject to applicable HFSS restrictions, which vary by retailer type and store size.
NOTES
1 Merchandising Must Haves, The Shopper Engagement Handbook, Vol3P from Brand Analytics for Mars Snacking, 2024
2 NIQ Scantrack data, Total GB Coverage to 27.12.25.
3 NielsenIQ Scantrack & Kantar WPO, Total S&G Confectionery, 24 weeks to w/e 27/12/25
4 NielsenIQ Scantrack Data to w/e 27/12/25
5 Nielsen IQ Scantrack Data to w/e 04/04/26
6 ONS, Census 2021
7 Kantar WPO Sept 2025
8 Kantar Demographic Analysis of White variants to 2020; NielsenIQ Retail Measurement Service, Total Coverage, Choc Boxed NPD Analysis
9 NielsenIQ Scantrack & Kantar WPO, Total Christmas Confectionery, 24 weeks to w/e 27/12/25
10 Kantar MyWorldpanel Data to w/e 12/07/26
11 Nielsen IQ Scantrack Data to w/e 11/07/26
12 Ehrenberg-Bass Institute for Marketing Science, Kantar & Nielsen Panel Data, 2024