India's consumers continue to be pessimistic about the future. Although the BluFin Indian Consumer Confidence Index, India's first measure of retail consumer outlook, improved marginally, it is hardly good news for consumer product marketers.
Consumers continue to fret over the Indian economy and future job prospects, with BluFin's India Consumer Confidence Index scoring 41.4 for April. The company said that the less than 50 score on the consumer index indicates pessimism.
The sub indices that measure spending, inflation and employment reflect that the consumer is shrouded in pessimism.
The Index measures the “pulse rate” of the Indian consumer and is based on a nation-wide monthly survey of 4,000 respondents across 18 cities in collaboration with market research company TNS.
Despite an 11.2 per cent increase, The Inflation Sentiment Index stood at 26.18, well under the magic score of 50. Consumers might be confident about their current jobs but are not so upbeat about alternative employment, which led the Employment Sentiment Index to be relatively flat.
Mr Rashid Bilimoria, CEO, BluFin India said, “Since the bottoming out of the CCI in December 2011, we have seen a fourth straight month of at least modestly reducing pessimism among consumers. However, we still appear to be some time away from seeing a buoyant consumer despite the recent RBI reduction in interest rates, and the current positive trend will need to be validated by improvements in the coming months to indicate a sustainable positive trend.”