Lessons from the British supermarket industry

I do believe a study of what is happening in the UK supermarket industry is an indicator of what could happen in other retail sectors around the world.

Twelve months ago Tesco’s was looked upon as the innovator in retailing, not only in the UK , but around the world. This company seems to be going from bad publicity to bad publicity and losing market share as a result. They set themselves up as the food supplier of everything to everybody with one pound in eight spent in retailing being spent in a Tesco’s.

Then the competition woke up. The John Lewis group that includes Waitrose have taken the high ground on customer service, Amazon Fresh have started taking the online business and Aldi and Lidl have really penetrated the market as the price cutters and have taken a large slice of the market.

I know a lot of people do not like the latest Lidl TV commercial, but it is a clever positioning statement and even farmers markets now realise Lidl is their main competitor. 

The lesson for all of us is that we need to be constantly looking at the market place and positioning our retail business to a changing market.

No retailer can afford to miss a beat.