Franchising, retail, business
12/10/2015
Tesco Plc will start giving Britons immediate discounts off their shopping bill if they buy branded goods that could have been purchased for less at one of the supermarket chain’s main competitors.
The deduction at the check-out intensifies a price war and is a break from the common practice of U.K. grocers issuing customers a voucher to spend on their next visit.
“Shoppers tell us price matching vouchers are a pain and don’t really help them," Matt Davies, Tesco’s head of U.K. and Ireland, said in a statement Monday.
The move by Cheshunt, England-based Tesco may test a sense of investor optimism around the grocery industry since J Sainsbury Plc said last month that it expected to moderately exceed full-year profit estimates. The industry had previously been beset by 18 months of falling prices and shrinking profit margins.
Tesco’s Brand Guarantee program is available only in larger stores and online. It will compare prices against those of Sainsbury, Wal-Mart Stores Inc’s Asda and Wm Morrison Supermarkets Plc, although not against German discounters Aldi and Lidl, whose growing popularity with shoppers has fueled the price war. The program will include products that are placed on promotion by Tesco’s biggest rivals.
Trials of the program in Northern Ireland met with “overwhelmingly" positive customer feedback, Tesco said in the statement.
By:http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-10-11/tesco-steps-up-price-battle-with-immediate-brand-match-program