One of the geographies available from IRI, it stands for “Multi Outlet” and is usually pronounced “moo-loh.” It includes the following channels: Food/Grocery, Drug, Mass Merchandisers, Walmart, Club Stores (BJs and Sam’s), Dollar Stores (Dollar General, Family Dollar, Fred’s Dollar), Military DECA (commissaries).
Reference article: Multi-Channel Markets
The 2 Spins geographies of “Natural Supermarkets” and “Specialty Gourmet Supermarkets” each have definition which includes “full-format supermarket selling more than $2 million in annual sales” Are these 2 geographies thus represented in the IRI traditonal supermarket definintion, which also has criteria of at least $2 Miilion ACV? Or are they exclusive?
As far as I know, the Natural and Specialty Gourmet channels available in SPINS are not included in IRI’s MULO market. And I don’t think there is a $2MM ACV threshold for those channels. You should check directly with SPINS on this but several manufacturers I know of add together the 3 channels available in SPINS (Natural, Specialty Gourmet and Conventional) to get to total sales. And since SPINS has a partnership with IRI, Conventional is the same as MULO.
Do we know if this has changed? Whole Foods may be rolling up to MULO now…
I think that IRI projects for Whole Foods but does not get data from them. So, yes, Whole Foods is included in MULO (and Food) but you cannot see it separately.
Hi Robin,
This is still correct. NielsenIQ has an exclusive agreement with Whole Foods for their data and IRI is projecting.
Thanks for the update!
Nielsen has Whole Foods pos data and it will be in xaoc mid 2020.
Jerry, Thanks for the update!
Hi Sally,
I was hoping you could clarify some questions I continue to be confused by:
(1) In SPINS, is there overlap between the Total US MULO channel and Total Natural channel — in other words, are the retailers within Total US MULO that would also show up in Total Natural?
(2) To arrive at an estimate for a proxy of “Total Market” in SPINS, can I add Total US MULO and Total Natural?
(3) Is Whole Foods Market included in the SPINS Total US MULO channel? I continue to be unclear on the answer to this — I always assumed the answer is yes because Total US MULO includes Food & Grocery (whether or not WFM is projected).
(4) For Nielsen (as of the period ending 10/1/2022), is Whole Foods included in the Total US xAOC? Again, I always assumed the answer is yes because Total US xAOC includes Total US Food.
Thanks Sally!
Hi Nick,
1) No, the SPINS retailers are not included in the MULO Grocery/Food universe (and they certainly wouldn’t fall into any of the other channels). The are also not included in Nielsen’s comparable xAOC Grocery/Food channel.
2) Yes, because there is no overlap.
3) & 4) Yes to both of these. WFM is considered to be part of the Food/Grocery universe by both Circana (the new name for IRI, which merged with NPD and changed their name to Circana) and Nielsen. Nielsen received data from Whole Foods Market and Circana projects sales for Whole Foods Market from panel data and other external sources. SPINS does not cover WFM.
You might think that a retailers like Sprouts Farmers Market might be covered in a channel sometimes called (by Nielsen and Circana) total Food but it’s not. Sprouts Farmers Market is only covered by SPINS. By the same token, you might consider WFM to be part of the natural channel and therefore covered by SPINS but it’s not. It’s part of the Circana and Nielsen Food channel (as mentioned above). Some of these designations may seem arbitrary but it’s also useful that they are consistent and that there is no overlap.