The price of baby diapers will go up 30% this year

Disposable nappies won’t escape inflation. So far, child protections have been relatively spared, but could see their prices rise in the coming days, at a rate of 30% by mid-2023. In one year, the price of everyday products (food, drinks, hygiene) increased by 14.45%. Inflation continues to rise and could reach 25% at least by June.

The price of baby diapers will go up

Despite inflation, diapers have so far been (relatively) spared. According to an article published March 1 onwards FranceInfo, cleaning and hygiene products that contain cellulose, such as toilet paper or blotting paper, have seen their prices increase by 20%, even 25% in the last year, against “only” 8, 5% of diapers. While the cost of manufacturing diapers has increased in the same way as other products with similar compounds, manufacturers have still made the decision to reduce their margins in 2022. They don’t see this as a concern for families, the reasons are purely financial: the diaper market is very competitive, there are many brands and their prices are particularly attractive. However, the producers now have to make up for their lost money.

Annual negotiations are held between producers and large-scale retailers to fix prices for the following year. These negotiations concluded on March 2 at midnight and risk dealing a fatal blow to the budgets of some families. However, the increase could be gradual, again, this is definitely not about altruism. Consumers typically stockpile products when an imminent price increase is announced. Scaling the increase would limit these behaviors.

Increasingly precarious families

Far from these negotiations, which unfortunately lack transparency, fears are aimed at the most precarious. The diaper budget is sizable in all households. During his life, a small child takes between 3,800 and 4,800 before going to the potty, which is an average of more than 1,000 per year. This outbreak suffocates even more the many families who are already struggling to keep up with the general rise in prices. Remember that the poorest families in France are very often made up of single mothers and their children. While women make up over 80% of single-parent households, 45% of them live in poverty. The food aid associations, for their part, deplore the ever-increasing number of beneficiaries and among them more and more families.

This increase in the price of diapers was probably considered inevitable by the manufacturers, but it adds a little more to the burden of the many families already living on very little money.