India’s fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) market has slipped in November due to price cuts triggered by the GST rate changes. All-India value growth stood at 4.4% for November 2025, below October’s 6.8%, data shared by retail intelligence platform Bizom shows.
Bizom does not provide volume growth figures. It tracks value growth across FMCG categories.
Slowdown Dynamics
Rural value growth, according to Bizom, was ahead of overall FMCG growth at 5.7% for November. But the gap between urban and rural value growth is once again widening, raising concerns about a stable recovery in urban areas. Urban value growth stood at 2.5% for November, after reporting a sharp rebound of 6.3% in October. Last month, rural value growth was 7.1%.
“The post-Diwali period in November does tend to show some weakness in demand. But this year the value growth numbers in November are depressed because the GST-induced lower-priced products have landed in stores,” Harshit Bora, analytics head, Bizom, said.
Bora said that the domestic FMCG market, especially in urban areas, may take a month to fully stabilise before showing a consistent performance in terms of growth rates. This point has been made by most other FMCG executives who point that the recovery in urban areas will be gradual.
“Inflation has begun to stabilise in the second half of the ongoing fiscal. It is softening gradually. Alongside this, the last Union Budget made important changes to income tax, which released a significant amount of money into the hands of consumers. I see consumers having the means to fulfil their aspirations. This positive trend in FMCG will continue into the second half of the current fiscal,” Manish Tiwary, CMD, Nestle India, said.
GST as Catalyst
Tiwary also pointed to double-digit value growth that the food category is seeing, as lower GST rates trigger a virtuous circle of growth in the segment. This is visible in Bizom data, with packaged food seeing a value growth of 13.6% year-on-year in November after reporting a weak 2.7% growth rate in October. This is due to lower product prices that has prompted a shift from unbranded to branded products, Bora said.
Executives such as Nikhil Sharma, MD, Perfetti Van Mella India, also see competition growing in foods, as smaller, but organised players benefit from GST tailwinds, much like larger players have.
“Lower GST will help smaller players to expand because their innovation and freight costs will reduce. Going forward, we expect competition to intensify in confectionary,” he said.
According to Bizom, categories such as chocolates and confectionary, beverages and dairy products reported a year-on-year value growth of 2.3%, 4.8% and 5.9% each in November, which is a mixed performance for these segments versus previous months. While the growth rate in beverages has rebounded in November after reporting a decline in October due to unseasonal rains, dairy products and chocolates and confectionary growth rates have slowed in November versus October. Last month, chocolates and confectionery reported a growth of 10.1%, while dairy products grew 18.6% versus the year-ago period, Bizom said.