nickshanagher

What to make of all these price-match guarantees in the supermarkets? A profit guarantee for the shops offering them, suggests the Economist . In a column last month it says price guarantees were a way of stopping a price war rather than participating in one. This is because when a newcomer offers lower prices it is trying to win your customers. If you promise your customers that you will match these prices then they will stay with you. The newcomer then has to give the price cuts to its existing customers without winning new ones and loses money. In real life it is not as simple as that. However, the Economist says that most consumers believe that price-matching signals genuinely lower prices. The consumer is wrong as it is more expensive supermarkets that are offering to match each other’s prices. The lower prices are at Aldi and Lidl. The response of wholesalers and consumer packaged goods suppliers is to price mark product for independent shops to signal value. There are ...

A short item in the Economist based on Kantar Worldpanel data shows what is happening to apple sales in the UK - they are going down. The varieties in growth are: 1. Jazz 2. Pink Lady 3. Braeburn 4. Gala And in decline are: 1. Granny Smith 2. Cox 3. Golden Delicious. Remember, these are figures only from shops that hand out till receipts, which means that Kantar does not measure the totality of the independent sector. But it is still a useful guide as to what to stock. More importantly the Economist interviews suppliers who explain the rise in Gala and Braeburn because consumers like the flavour, supermarkets like them because they are grown all around the world so they are always available and growers like them because they have longer seasons than traditional English varieties. But Pink Lady, now the fourth most popular variety in Britain, is another fruit covered by strict quality controls and no British farmer is licensed to grow it. Apples are becoming more like...

Originally published in May but given to me in a free taster issue handed out last week, the Economist has formed the view that supermarket-bashing is "elitist and muddle-headed". Its target is the Tesco bashing where the opening of a new outlet coincides with the closure of local shops. The political response from David Cameron and Ed Miliband was to "bring back the bustle to our high streets" and "people think the character of their local high street is being changed and they have no power against big corporations" respectively. What will happen? Nothing suggests the Economist, pointing out that the Competition Commission found in 2008 that the grocery market represented a good deal for consumers. The business magazine goes on to question how new the problem is, pointing to research from Surrey and Exeter universities that shows that as far back as 1939 chain stores and co-ops controlled half the market (up to two thirds today). And it shows that...