Americans pay in cash to have ‘biggest Easter in the world’

There will be Easter in Americanas. For this, the retail chain had to overcome the distrust of the industry, pay for orders in cash and in advance and reduce the volume of chocolate eggs on the vines that will begin to be supplied in the chain’s stores shortly after Carnival.

There will be 13 million Easter eggs, of which almost half of the own brand, D’elicce, and more the regular line chocolates, an important segment of the chain’s sales.

Under judicial recovery, Americanas saw, in just over a month, its credit conditions melt in the market since a billionaire accounting scandal was made public. It did not consider, however, containing the (self-declared) megalomania of being the largest retailer of chocolate eggs in the world.

“The great good news is that there will be Easter at Americanas and it will be a great event, as it always has been. We are going to make it the biggest of all time”, says the retailer’s commercial director, Aleksandro Pereira. According to him, at no time was the possibility of the company not having the Easter campaign discussed.

“Obviously, when the judicial recovery happened, we needed adjustments with the industry”, he says. The big change in planning came from the method of payment. Suppliers also had concerns about the chain’s ability to keep purchases to date.

The negotiations, which had been going on since November and December of last year, had to be redone after the judicial reorganization. Most suppliers required payment in cash or in advance.

Traditionally, according to Americanas, payment for Easter eggs was made between 15 days and a month after the date. The new dynamic allowed the retailer to negotiate discounts, but the volume of eggs purchased was lower than initially planned.

“The industry was a little worried about whether we were going to do it or not, but we made daily contact”, says Pereira.

The expectation of Americanas is to beat last year’s sales result. Under scrutiny by control bodies, such as the CVM (Securities and Exchange Commission), the company does not disclose the growth projection, but, according to the network’s commercial director, the date intends to be, for the retailer, the confirmation that the business continue.

The importance of Easter sales for the retailer was even mentioned in the request for judicial recovery forwarded to the Justice of Rio de Janeiro on January 19th.

Officially, the Easter campaign in stores starts on March 1st. In recent weeks, orders that will be dispatched to the thousands of stores in the chain and to e-commerce have started to arrive at a distribution center in the north of São Paulo. The warehouse is refrigerated and is leased by the company only for the Easter campaign.

Americanas is also betting its chips on its own brand eggs, among which licensed products stand out (such as LOL dolls or Peppa Pig dolls). The date on which Easter falls this year, April 9, is also seen favorably by the company’s commercial director, due to its proximity to the date on which workers usually receive wages.

Aleksandro Pereira says he hasn’t noticed big changes in egg sizes or variety for this year’s campaign. By 2022, the industry had already registered greater consumer interest in smaller and cheaper eggs.

Americanas’ commercial director points out that the network has a portfolio of 120 types of eggs in all price ranges, which fit in all pockets. On average, the price adjustment compared to 2022 should be around 10%. “But Easter has a day-to-day seasonality and this varies according to the turnover. If you are selling more, the price drops.”

On Friday (10), Americanas released a 30-day balance sheet for the crisis it is experiencing – the existence of accounting inconsistencies in its balance sheets was disclosed on January 11. In a statement, the company says it is operating normally, with stores open and shelves full.