In 2025, promotions accounted for 21.9% of FMCG sales in hypermarkets and supermarkets, a twenty-year record according to NielsenIQ. Promotions have thus become the leading commercial lever in the fast-moving consumer goods sector. However, this lever is losing its effectiveness, and promotional profitability is declining along with it.
In the first half of 2026, promotions accounted for just 20% of FMCG sales growth, compared with 57% a year earlier, according to Circana. At the same time, promotional pressure continued to increase. In other words: more promotions, less growth. Across the campaigns we analyse, 72% are unprofitable. Yet most looked successful in internal reports: volumes were up, sell-out targets were met, and retailers were satisfied. The problem, therefore, lies less with promotions themselves than with how they are measured. Measuring a promotion: three figures, but only the last one really matters A promotional campaign should be assessed at three levels:
- Gross volume: what was sold during the campaign. This is the figure everyone looks at.
- Incremental volume: the difference between actual sales and what would have been sold without the promotion (the baseline), after accounting for cannibalisation and stockpiling effects.
- Incremental margin: the margin generated (or lost) by the campaign after deducting the cost of promotional investments.
Yet most reporting stops at the first level, when decisions should be based on the third. This is where the real difference lies between a promotion that is “successful” and one that is profitable.
