Is happening alreadyt - direct sales is one way via the 'net - plus local markets.
Ive had fruit HALF the supermarket price from local markets.
I got 8 whole lemon soles from the one last week for 2 quid - they had to go mate...so fa thats one meal for three and one to go..
I was about to ask what the problem was. Windows' hold is based primarily on compatibility, an issue that doesnt exist with food. If it did, you'd only be able to use tesco marge and jam on your tesco bread, but of course it isnt that way.
Whats so bad about the more successful businesses taking the place of the less?
NT
You *can* find an alternative - but you have to be an active participant in order to keep the alternative(s) alive. Are consumers willing to work at it - for computers - or for retail goods? Many of the complaints of the Countryside Alliance should be addressed to the retail monopolies - but their organosers have chosen to deflect the criticism to the government and I see no other group interested in taking action other than in niche areas.
Until more people start doing this Tesco will continue to expand.
They offer what all of their massive volumes of customers want... cheap food. The competition between supermarkets over the last x years has been primarily based on price. Low price is what people demand - not high quality. If you have to choose between the two people go for low price. This is the market in which Tesco is competing and so far they are doing what they do better than the competition. This is a fairly simple case of market forces at work. If the majority didn't want what they are offering they'd have to reform or go bust.
I'd personally like to think that the whole food market is going to implode pretty soon. The evidence that processed foods are killing us is growing stronger and stronger. Sooner or later there is going to be a catalyst story in the tabloids and everyone will adopt it as their latest hobby horse and then the cheap suppliers will be in trouble. Well... one can only hope.
If you'd like to read an interesting article by David Aaronovitch about modern diet, healthy eating and losing weight then follow this link:
I disagree. People want both and Tesco delivers both.
I overheard two managers talking in a Morrison's. They said that Waitrose are showing interest in buying out the group. I don't know if there is any grounding for that. Morrisons haven't even absorbed Safeway yet. Morrisons shares have dropped because of the difficulties in merging the two supermarkets. Now is the time to swoop.
Of course people WANT both cheap prices and high quality but in the majority of food lines stocked by all supermarkets, not just Tesco, a choice has been made to provide cheap food with long shelf lifes at the expense of quality. Supermarkets may deliver some higher quality items, but they are not the items with the low prices.
And by quality I mean the food actually being close to having the nutritional and taste qualities of the sum of it's constituent parts. The very fact that manufacturers process the crap out of the raw ingredients to the extent that it no longer tastes of anything or looks like anything recognisable by the consumer means that it then has to be filled with colourings, flavourings and tons of salt to ensure people don't just reject it outright. It's a sleight of hand, a trick, an illusion.
Sadly, it's not cheap.
Tthere are some of who do.
Some, not everyone.
That's true.
yes.
We, the Fishers, want very good food. That's why we don't buy ANY processed foods, we make and/or grow our own and only eat meat from a daughter's organic, free range, rare breed farm or a friend's, which is similarly produced. Or game. We rarely eat fish (because of diminishing stocks of wild and farmed is an atrocity).
Food is the one thing we refuse to economise on - but I suspect that our food bill is perhaps less per head than most people's. We live on a small pension but our savings grow ...
they're good guidance for everyone, not just fatties.
Mary
. and choice. You can buy cheaper if you go elsewhere, but you won't have 93 different sorts of bread to choose from. Most of my food comes from Farmfoods who are much cheaper than Tesco - for the same branded products. But the range is fairly limited.
Costco in the USA do caskets:
Yes that's a good point. The other big aspect of the problem is that of 'convenience'. This is also part of the driving force behind the poor quality of processed food, because people wont cook for themselves. Also the convenience of being able to drive to one place and fill the boot with a whole weeks worth of shopping. Going to many places or small places several times a week is not convenient enough.
Nothing till they become a monopoly and then can do what they like pricewise and isn't there (or 'shouldn't there be') more to life that getting folk to work more for less?
Wouldn't natrual trends generally control supply and demand, all be it plumbers or shops / whatever? A shop up the road drops the price on lightbulbs and another reduces plugtops, still enough margin on all the other lines to make a decent living and everyone lives happily ever after?
Then Tes*o / whoever come along and undecut (to start with ) all the most popular lines, killing the local shops. They they hoik the prices back up and (as mentioned) stock what they want (brand wise if nothing else) rather than what we need?
What I also dislike about all these 'sheds' (apart from the bland shopping experience / musak) is the proceedure you often have to go through if you need to take anything back.
You queue to ask for advice, are told to go to 'Customer Services', to queue again (first waiting for any member of staff then they get the 'right' member if you are lucky). They wander off with yer (duff) goods and more often or not come back saying they don't have any more in stock so come back another day to try again?
Yer local shop might apoligise, and if they hadn't got a replacement, take your details and phone you when the replacement is in stock (or offer to deliver it to you)?
We had to get our daughter SE Mobile repaired under g'tee. We dropped it off and 6 weeks later got a phone call saying 'are you coming to collect this phone'?
I asked if they had left a message or called me before and I had missed it and they said 'no, we don't ring you, you ring us, luckily I had some spare time to call you or it would have gone in the crusher ..?"
Customer service eh ..
All the best ..
T i m
The same for Lidl, Netto and Aldi. The core products they sell are what most people buy and "much" cheaper, and most is branded too.
But do we all want that .. at any cost (and I know you weren't saying we do).
I have often heard mention by those that know that many of these 'bulk' lines are tasteless, like tomatos for example. An old mate who has been running a nice 'family' sized business for 40 years (growing tomatoes) had now given up against cheap imports from the likes of Poland .. force grown in (oil burning) heated green-houses 365, using various chemicals and are tasteless?
But, they are all the same size, weight and bright red so we luv them?
All the best ..
T i m
Window's hold is in destroying standards and compatibility to force users to upgrade when Microsoft tell you to jump.
Slavery.
You do what they want when they want. You upgrade to their timetable or you buy the products that they stock and your favourite goes to the wall if it doesn't match Tescos requirements.
I thought so to. It's the cumulative, small impacts that are the most frightening really.
And although I don't know you, I've gleaned enough from your posts to know that you and your family were most definitely not the target of my comments. :-)
no point was it pointed out that although David lost a stone in weight, due to his exercise regime he would have lost more than a stone of fat but gained a bit of lean mass.
Any kind of diet and exercise regime which equates losing weight as success (and therefore failing to lose weight as a failure) is flawed as far as I'm concerned and even one like that in the article which did measure other things seems to have fallen into the trap that loss of weight is a good measure of progress.
What often happens is that someone embarking on a sensible diet/exercise regime will gain weight to start with, as they start to build up muscle, strengthen bones, ligaments etc. and then give up because "it's not working". If they had persevered, they would have noticed that they were slimmer than before and, after a few more weeks their weight would start to fall.
Physical health is one area where it's good to be dense !
Cheers,
John
That's not been true of Tesco for about ten / fifteen years. They used to be cheap and cheerful but worked very hard on going upmarket. For about ten years they very consciously copied Sainsbury in aiming for the quality end of the market. Now Sainsbury are desperately copying Tesco to try and appeal to the mass market.
Tesco high end (Finest* range) competes with Sainsbury and M&S Food on quality whilst being competitive on price. 70% of Tesco customers buy both Finest and Value ranges, which they reflect in their current advertising. People can choose on what they want to economise.
Owain
Ah, the good old days of retail price maintenance.
Owain
Yeh, their PCs are very poor quality and generated lot of Trading Standards complaints. Seen 'em on Watchdog too.
because one day you only have one very very successful business, and its prices double overnight...
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