A recent survey from the Private Label Manufacturers Association (PLMA) of supermarket prices on 25 commonly purchased items found that shoppers could save over 35 percent by buying the store brand rather than the national brand. This finding held true across the store, with private label breakfast cereal and refrigerated orange juice going for $4.91 vs. $7.13 for their national-brand equivalents; store-brand hot dogs, buns; and a 12-pack of soda costing $7.52 vs. $10.53 for the national-brand items; and store-brand hand sanitizer and nasal spray retailing for $10.65, instead of $18.47 for national brands.

According to the research, which looked at the pricing on grocery and household items at a typical supermarket, consumers buying the private label products would save $32.93 on average on the total market basket, representing savings of 35.3 percent when compared with weekly purchases of national brands in the same categories. Savings on individual items ranged from 13 percent on hot dogs to 66 percent on nasal spray.

PLMA compared a leading national brand product with a similar store-brand product in each category, adjusting prices to account for all known discounts, coupons and promotions available for each of the weeks included in the study. The survey was repeated weekly during a recent 4-week time span in a Northeastern suburban supermarket.

Yearly store-brand sales have risen to $85 billion in 2009, the latest industry statistics show, with those products accounting for an unprecedented 23 percent of items sold in U.S. supermarkets.

New York-based PLMA represents over 3,000 companies involved in the manufacture and distribution of store-brand products, including food, beverages, snacks, health and beauty aids, over-the-counter drugs, household cleaners and chemicals, and general merchandise.