Variety of German Paper
& Foil Products Gives Consumers Choices
BY ASTRID UEBELGUENN

Aromata from Lidl and Folia from St. Jozev show some German plastic bags, while ja! from the Rewe family gets represented by plastic wrap.

Retail strategies range from 100% private label at Aldi to varying mixes of single and multiple private labels with national brands elsewhere.

The supply of private labels on the highly competitive market of household and personal care products that are made of paper, plastic, or aluminum is enormous. Retailers have developed PL product lines that are often as varied as the ranges of the national brands. Whereas Aldi offers only PL retail chains like real, toom, or Eurospar offer both national brands and PL but tend to place PL goods in less prominent shelf positions.

HL Deutscher Supermarkt (German supermarket), toom, Akzenta, Kaufpark, Eurospar, and A&P Kaiser's offer PL articles in uniform packaging. The packaging design is relatively simple, just showing the PL name and some catchwords emphasizing certain advantages, with simple decorative elements.
A&P Kaiser'S has its kitchen tissues, handkerchiefs and cosmetic tissues under the Royal Comfort name, characterized by a crown above the brand name.

The ja! PL line is offered by members of the Rewe family, such as Akzenta, Kaufpark, toom and HL. ja! toilet paper comes in equivalent sizes and qualities to German national brands (Zewa, Servus, Hakle). Beside the new moist toilet paper, there is 2-ply recycling toilet paper, 3-ply tissue toilet paper, and 4-ply luxury toilet paper.

Kaufpark and Akzenta offer garbage bags, aluminum foil, plastic wrap and sandwich paper in the quickpack brand. toom and HL, however, offer this product group under ja! and under Modern Kitchen (Moderne Kueche), another uniformly designed Rewe PL line.

30 m rolls of foil from Lidl's Aromata, Rewe's ja!, and Wal-Mart's Great Value.

real's garbage bag section consists of 6 shelves: The top three shelves are occupied by Melitta's Swirl, with shelves four and five holding Pap Star (two German national brands). real's TiP garbage bags are placed in the bottom shelf. This hierarchy is repeated with aluminum foil.

Wal-Mart's PL household line is marketed as Great Value, the same name as in America. Great Value aluminum foil, freezer bags (two sizes), plastic wrap and sandwich paper are displayed in eye-level in one long row on the shelf. Great Value sandwich bags and five different types of garbage bags (all bio-degradable) are positioned either directly beneath or beside Melitta's Toppits, with quickpack below them. Framed on both sides by national brand products (Bounty), Great Value kitchen towels are displayed in a shelf of their own.

Plus offers its PL personal hygiene articles under the name Spagat. Its PL household product line is named Selina. The Spagat line is composed of kitchen tissues, 2-ply, 3-ply and 4-ply toilet paper, and of handkerchiefs (6 or 18 10-count packs). The PL line Selina comprises plastic wrap, aluminum foil, freezer bags, sandwich bags, sandwich paper, backing paper, and garbage bags of three sizes. The Plus logo is printed in relatively unobtrusive places on the Spagat and Selina packaging.

Penny Markt (Penny Market), also a Rewe member, has its own PL with a special name for every product group: TaTue (abbreviation for German "Taschentuecher" meaning "handkerchiefs"), Sylvana (household products), Happy End (toilet paper), Clina (garbage bags).

Lidl's Cien product line comprises kitchen towels, 2-ply and 3-ply toilet paper, napkins of different plain colors, and handkerchiefs. Under Siempre, 4-ply toilet paper and napkins with designs of flowers, fruit, or teddy bears are offered. Aromata includes plastic wrap, aluminum foil, freezer bags, and sandwich bags. The product information of the freezer bags is printed in seven different languages; this is typical of many LIDL PL articles.

Vitess, Aldi's 3-ply recycling toilet paper, is marked by the "blue angel," the German sign for environmentally beneficial products. The Solo line consisting of SOLO Zartess 3-ply toilet paper-the product name is a Frenchified word construction with the French ending "-ess[e]" added to the German adjective "zart" (gentle)-Solo Saugwunder (absorption miracle) kitchen tissues, and Solo Talent handkerchiefs.

kd Kaiser's drugstore markets its PL foil and paper goods under the name fix-frisch (quick-fresh). The fix-frisch line is comprised of aluminum foil, plastic wrap, sandwich paper, sandwich bags, backing paper, and three types of garbage bags. kd's PL moist toilet paper, napkins, handkerchiefs, and kitchen tissues are marketed by the kd company logo. The logo is framed by the slogan "Premium Quality."

dm markets its range of PL household products under the name Die HaushaltsProfis ("The household pros"). It comprises two sizes of coffee filters, sandwich bags, sandwich paper, backing paper, plastic wrap, aluminum foil, aluminum trays for grilling, ice cube bags, freezer bags, universal plastic clasps, and garbage bags. Customers can choose between a 30 meter roll of Die Haushaltsprofis aluminum foil in silver cardboard packaging, silver plastic foil, or a 10-meter roll in silver plastic foil.

dm's 3-ply kitchen tissues (available in packs of 2 or of 4 rolls) are marketed under the name saugstark & sicher ("very absorbent & safe"), the toilet paper as sanft & sicher ("gentle & safe"), and the handkerchiefs as soft & sicher ("soft & safe"). The sanft & sicher line comprises 3-ply toilet paper of two packaging sizes, the Premium 4-ply toilet paper (two packaging sizes), and three varieties of Premium Airlaid-Quality moist toilet tissue. The moist toilet paper is offered in Classic (dewy), Camomile (soothing), and Marigold (re-creaming). It is available in canisters containing 70 tissues, in 70-count refill packages, in economy packs of two refill packages, and in a small cardboard box containing 15 singly packaged tissues.

The Schlecker drugstore chain personalizes the whole range of its PL with the company logo. Only the 100-count pack of loose handkerchiefs, offered under the name Lino, is not included in this program. AS Eco ("ÖKO") handkerchiefs belong to Schlecker's PL Eco-line, completed by recycling toilet paper and kitchen tissues.

The packaging of the AS plastic wrap is colored in almost the same tone of green as is the packaging of its national brand neighbor (Melitta's Toppits). The AS range is completed by two types of paper garbage bags for organic waste.

A very prominent place is given to the AS general-purpose household wipes that are displayed in outdoor baskets in front of the drug store. The AS household wipes are available in anti-bacterial (in a blue resealable refill pack of 48 cloths), and lemon active (in a yellow pack).