For years, South Africa’s informal retail sector has flourished beneath the surface, often remaining a blind spot for major FMCG brands. Despite the immense potential of the informal market network, this “hidden economy” has historically been difficult to quantify through traditional methods. Field Agent SA is actively seeking to transform how formal retailers perceive this landscape; our latest initiative unlocks unprecedented visibility into the informal markets, finally bringing real-time insights to official formal retailers.
We recently conducted a targeted mission in Thembisa, Pretoria, specifically focusing on the cooking oil category. We sent our agents to perform a deep-dive, “shelf-by-shelf" audit to gather granular data. By focussing on GPS pin locations, we were able to visit 120 localised informal trade stores geographically spread across seven zones, ensuring that only informal traders were visited and that no store was visited twice.
Only stores containing the cooking oil were visited, we collected overview and shelf photos, enough to perform a thorough decoding of brand and pack size availability, share of shelf, and price labelling. Where visibility was reduced, we also collected prices for the relevant products. As is with all our fieldwork, all visits were logged with pin location IDs, timestamps, and GPS coordinates.
Consider this: By utilising these granular metrics, formal retailers can move beyond estimation to evidence-based strategy. This data allows companies to track how products are displayed, purchased, and consumed over time by identifying preferred quantities and sizes, quantifying market share within the informal sector, and optimising supply chain distribution to reach previously invisible customers all while adjusting pricing strategies to effectively compete with localised brand dominance.
The primary aim of this mission was to quantify the competitive landscape for six major cooking oil brands: Excella, D’Lite, Sunstar, Super Star, Pan, and Sunola. By leveraging the Field Agent SA platform, our agents successfully moved beyond standard audits to map the granular, shelf-level realities of the informal market, transforming complex township retail dynamics into clear and actionable insights:
Consider this: Accessing these real-time, shelf-level insights enables formal retailers to understand why specific brands thrive in unique zones. It provides the competitive intelligence necessary to refine brand positioning, allowing retailers to defend their market share against local informal competitors by understanding exactly what pack sizes and price points move the fastest in the township environment.
Our insights reveal distinct brand performance and distribution patterns across the Thembisa township, showing how specific brands and pack sizes align with consumer purchasing behaviours. While Excella maintains a significant presence, the data identifies critical competitive dynamics that inform broader retail strategy.
Excella and D'Lite lead the category with the highest pin-level availability across locations, while niche alternatives like Super Star and Sunola record the lowest presence in individual township stores.
This pack-size breakdown illustrates the granular distribution of volume and shelf space across different container sizes in the surveyed outlets to reflect these volume preferences:
This comprehensive brand-by-brand breakdown details the exact availability, share of shelf, and average litre pricing captured across the surveyed outlets to contextualise these distribution patterns:
Consider this: By pinpointing exactly which brands and pack sizes drive volume in the informal sector, companies can optimise their supply chain distribution to reach previously invisible customers and refine their pricing to effectively counter localised brand dominance.
Operating in the informal market requires extreme adaptability. Our agents navigated several complex operational hurdles while maintaining data collection standards to ensure the success and safety of the mission.
Consider this: Understanding these operational hurdles helps formal retailers design more resilient distribution models. By acknowledging the realities of the informal environment, companies can create more practical partnership programmes with shopkeepers and develop supply chain solutions that specifically account for the logistical nuances of township retail.
Wherever possible, Field Agent SA optimises its auditing capabilities through full-scale automation. Actively integrating AI-driven analysis to transform these metrics into rapid, high-volume intelligence.
Consider this: The shift toward AI-driven automation significantly reduces the time-to-market for consumer insights. Formal retailers can move from reactive planning to proactive execution, utilising longitudinal data to anticipate market shifts, optimise stock allocation, and maintain a consistent, data-backed presence in the rapidly changing informal sector.
By shining light on the informal markets within the South African landscape, the dynamics of its economy reward those with the visibility to understand it. By replacing industry-wide estimations with real-time, shelf-by-shelf intelligence, we are closing the gap between the township shelf and the formal retailers.
The shift from manual auditing to AI-driven, real-time insights is not just an operational upgrade; it is a necessity. As formal retailers look to expand their reach and secure long-term loyalty in South Africa’s most vibrant retail pockets, the ability to adapt to localised consumer behaviour will be the ultimate differentiator. Our Thembisa mission has proved to be a powerful tool for formal retailers, successfully turning the "hidden" informal economy into a measurable, data-driven landscape.
If you are ready to turn these insights into your next strategic advantage, click on the button below to bring your brand’s retail performance into focus:
Regards,
The Field Agent Team.