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Household care: a homerun for wipes: floor cleaning cloths boost household wipes market beyond baby wipes in North America.

Article Excerpt
Once dominated by baby wipes, the North American wipes market's largest segment is now household cleaning wipes or so says a report recently issued by INDA, Association of the Nonwoven Fabrics Industry. According to association data, the household cleaning sub-segment, at $1.3 billion last year, accounted for 45% of the $3.8 billion North American consumer wipes market.

"The household wipes segment has benefited from the introduction of new floor cleaning wipes, antibacterial wipes, polishing wipes and a variety of new product introductions and is now the largest segment ... larger than baby wipes," explained Ian Butler, INDA's director of research and statistics.

According to INDA's recent analysis of the household cleaning wipes market, floor cleaning wipes such as Swifter, Clorox and Pledge Grab It account for more than half of the market. Disinfecting/hard surface wipes were another major category with strong growth. This segment is expected to surpass a half billion dollars in retail sales by 2010.

And, while this analysis focused on the North American market, household cleaning wipes are experiencing similar dominance throughout the world. According to statistics offered by Euromonitor, Western European sales of dry electrostatic wipes have increased from $95.3 million in 1999 to $357 million in 2004 while they have increased from $160 million to $200 million in the Asia-Pacific region. Meanwhile sales of impregnated wet wipes in Western Europe increased from $38.6 million in 1999 to $731.5 million in 2004 and from $129 million to $186 million in the Asia-Pacific region.

Industry observers don't expect the high growth levels of the past five years to be repeated but still see plenty of room for increased volumes, either through continued expansion of existing products, albeit on a smaller scale, or through new products.

"It is difficult to forecast the future as much of this growth has been driven by the introduction of new products," said Mr. Butler, "such as floor cleaning and disinfecting/hard surface wipes but producers are constantly introducing new products and packaging put-ups making these products more portable and increasing the ease and convenience to use."

Good For Nonwovens

According to INDA estimates, the North American wipes industry consumed 171,900 tons...

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