ORLANDO, Fla. – What to Know:
- Store brands (private labels) have reached record sales and are growing in popularity faster than national brands.
- Many shoppers now buy private labels because of quality – not just for lower prices.
- Retailers earn higher profits on their own brands, giving them a powerful incentive to expand selection.
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Walk down almost any grocery aisle today and you’ll notice something that would have been hard to imagine a generation ago: retailers are increasingly competing against national brands with brands of their own.
It’s a transformation that’s quietly reshaping the way Americans shop.
Whether it’s Publix, Walmart, Target, Costco, Trader Joe’s, Winn-Dixie, or ALDI, stores are devoting more shelf space to items carrying their own brand names. While grocery stores have long sold their own brands, those products were traditionally viewed as a way to save money.
Today, many shoppers say lower prices are no longer the only reason to buy, quality has become part of the equation, too. And that’s not by accident.
Many consumers say they are buying private label products because they believe the quality rivals – or even exceeds – that of the national brands they’ve trusted for years.
The Private Label Evolution
For decades, grocery stores largely acted as middlemen, selling products made by companies like Kraft Heinz, General Mills, Kellogg’s, Campbell’s and PepsiCo. The model: Manufacturer → Retailer → Consumer.
Fast-forward to 2026 and analysts are noticing a trend that has been in the works for years: retailers are becoming product companies, investing heavily in brands they both own and control. That traditional Manufacturer → Retailer → Consumer model still exists; the difference is that many retailers are no longer simply distributors.
They’re increasingly becoming brand owners themselves.
Retailers have spent years improving their private labels: everything from their take on established recipes to redesigning packaging to expanding premium product lines. The shift isn’t just changing what consumers buy – it’s changing the grocery business itself.
Every time a shopper chooses a private label over a national brand (store brand sales are growing nearly three times faster than national brands), the retailer typically keeps a larger share of the profit. That helps explain why chains continue expanding their private label offerings into everything from pantry staples and frozen foods to premium coffee, organic products, and gourmet snacks.
And the strategy appears to be paying off.
According to the Private Label Manufacturers Association (citing Circana retail sales data), store brand sales reached a record $282.8 billion in 2025, up nearly $9 billion from the previous year. Underscoring just how mainstream private labels have become, store brands also now account for more than one out of every five dollars spent on consumer packaged goods and nearly one out of every four products sold.
Consumer Reports said that store brands typically undercut national brands by 25 to 30 percent. An analysis by NetCredit found discounts exceeding 50% in frozen foods, 67% on some condiments, and nearly 75% on sports hydration drinks.
One trade publication summed up the growth of store brands succinctly:
“Private brands aren’t riding a wave. They are the wave.”
Brand Names Beware
Gone are the days when store brands came in generic packaging and occupied the bottom shelf. Today a lot of those products are front and center throughout the store. And for many retailers, they’ve become a cornerstone of the business. Consider these examples:
- Walmart’s Great Value is the largest private label brand in the U.S.
- The Kirkland Signature brand generates roughly one-third of Costco’s annual sales. Revenue from BJ’s private labels are also in the same ballpark.
- ALDI says more than 90% of the products on its shelves are exclusive ALDI brands.
- Trader Joe’s is estimated to sell roughly 85% of its products under its own private label brands.
But perhaps the biggest questions consumers have are these: “Who’s behind the private labels? And are they generally as good, or better, than the national brands?”
Sometimes a private label is produced by the same company that makes a familiar national brand. Sometimes it’s made by an entirely different manufacturer. And even when two products come from the same factory, they aren’t necessarily made using the same recipe, ingredients, or quality standards.
Retailers rarely disclose who manufactures their private label products. In many cases, manufacturers are contractually prohibited from discussing those relationships, fueling endless consumer speculation about who is actually behind the brands.
Odds are that you’ve already bought – and probably enjoyed – far more private label products than you realize.
Costco has Kirkland Signature. Sam’s Club sells Member’s Mark. BJ’s offers Wellsley Farms and Berkley Jensen. Walmart has brands such as Great Value, Marketside, and Prima Della. Target has Good & Gather, Favorite Day, and Market Pantry. Kroger, Albertsons, and Publix have each developed extensive private label lineups of their own.
Collectively, these brands generate tens of billions of dollars in annual sales and have become some of the most recognizable names in American retail.
But even if the same company makes both a brand name and private label item, there are numerous factors that differentiate the final products including ingredients, recipes, quality standards, sourcing, testing, and most visibly, packaging.
And then there’s this: manufacturers don’t simply decide to create a new version of a product like “generic toasted oats cereal” and then go looking for a retailer to pick it up. Instead, it’s the retailer who initiates the process: they decide what product they want to offer, and then specify the flavor, ingredients, package size, and, perhaps most importantly, the target price. Manufacturers then compete for the contract.
That said, retailers have spent years improving their private label offerings.
Many retailers now invest heavily in product development, product formulation, branding, consumer insights, and innovation in an effort to compete directly with national brands rather than simply undercut them on price.
Is it paying off? One publication thinks so.
Over the years, Consumer Reports has repeatedly found that some store brands perform as well as – or even better than – the national brands in blind taste tests across a variety of food categories. Store brand staples such as milk, flour, sugar, canned vegetables, and frozen fruit often perform similarly to national brands. More specialized products – such as breakfast cereals, soft drinks, or condiments – may vary more depending on personal taste.
And one more thing: according to Consumer Reports, private labels might be among the last brands to succumb to shrinkflation.
Will National Brands Disappear?
Despite the recent surge in private label sales, don’t expect national brands to vanish from store shelves anytime soon. According to Nielsen IQ, “62% of shoppers say they still default to the branded products they know and trust.” Part of the reason: companies continue to spend billions of dollars each year developing new products, improving existing ones, and marketing brands that consumers have trusted for generations.
And in many cases, those established companies are the innovators.
National brands often introduce new flavors, formulas, and technologies, while private labels usually only follow with their own versions once consumer demand has been established.
Why? Because innovation comes with risk. History is littered with products that never caught on, from Frito-Lay Lemonade to Clairol “Touch of Yogurt” Shampoo to Jimmy Dean Chocolate Chip Pancake-Wrapped Sausages. Yes, every one of those things was a real product.
For many shoppers, a favorite cereal, soft drink or condiment is more than just another product on the shelf – it’s the taste they’ve grown up with and come to trust. For retailers, however, the incentive to keep expanding their own brands remains strong. Why? Because every time a shopper reaches for a store brand instead of a national one, the retailer typically earns a higher profit while strengthening loyalty to its own brand.
Store brands were once viewed as a fallback – something shoppers bought only when money was tight. Today, they’re increasingly becoming a first choice. And as retailers continue investing in brands of their own, the battle for grocery shoppers may no longer be fought only on price, but on whose name appears on the package.
The days when shoppers automatically assumed “generic” meant “inferior” appear to be fading. For many consumers, the question has become much simpler: “Is the name on the package worth paying more for?”