A supermarket is a self-service shop offering a wide variety of food, beverages and household products, organized into sections. This kind of store is larger and has a wider selection than earlier grocery stores, but is smaller and more limited in the range of merchandise than a hypermarket or big-box market. In everyday United States usage, however, "grocery store" is often used to mean "supermarket".
Tesco plc is a British multinational groceries and general merchandise retailer headquartered in Welwyn Garden City, England. In 2011, it was the third-largest retailer in the world measured by gross revenues and the ninth-largest in the world measured by revenues. It has shops in Ireland, the United Kingdom, the Czech Republic, Hungary, and Slovakia. It is the market leader of groceries in the UK.
Safeway Limited is a British groceries brand, and former chain of supermarkets and convenience shops. The British Safeway was founded in 1962 by the American Safeway Inc., before being sold to Argyll Foods in 1987. It was later listed on the London Stock Exchange. It was purchased by Morrisons in March 2004. Most of its 479 shops were rebranded as Morrisons, with others being sold. Safeway-branded shops disappeared from the United Kingdom on 24 November 2005.
Wm Morrison Supermarkets Limited, trading as Morrisons, is the fifth largest supermarket chain in the United Kingdom. As of 2021, the company had 497 supermarkets across England, Wales and Scotland, and one in Gibraltar. The company is headquartered in Bradford, England.
J Sainsbury plc, trading as Sainsbury's, is a British supermarket and the second-largest chain of supermarkets in the United Kingdom, with a 14.6% share of UK supermarket sales in September 2022.
A grocery store (AE), grocery shop (BE) or simply grocery is a foodservice retail store that primarily retails a general range of food products, which may be fresh or packaged. In everyday U.S. usage, however, "grocery store" is a synonym for supermarket, and is not used to refer to other types of stores that sell groceries. In the UK, shops that sell food are distinguished as grocers or grocery shops (though in everyday use, people usually use either the term "supermarket" or a "corner shop".
Waitrose Limited, trading as Waitrose & Partners, is a brand of British supermarkets, founded in 1904 as Waite, Rose & Taylor, later shortened to Waitrose. It was acquired in 1937 by employee-owned retailer John Lewis Partnership, which still sells groceries under the brand. Its head offices are located in Bracknell, Berkshire.
Aldi is the common company brand name of two German multinational family-owned discount supermarket chains operating over 12,000 stores in 18 countries. The chain was founded by brothers Karl and Theo Albrecht in 1946, when they took over their mother's store in Essen. The business was split into two separate groups in 1960, that later became Aldi Nord, headquartered in Essen, and Aldi Süd, headquartered in Mülheim.
Ocado Group plc is a British business based in Hatfield, England, which licenses grocery technology. It also owns a 50% share in the UK grocery retail business Ocado.com. The company is listed on the London Stock Exchange and is a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index.
In the Republic of Ireland, the retail sector provides one of the largest sources of employment in the economy, representing over 12% of the workforce. As of 2017, approximately 40,000 wholesale and retail businesses employed almost 280,000 people in Ireland, with the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment reporting that 90% of these businesses were Irish-owned.
Shoprite Limited was a community food store chain in the Isle of Man. It was a wholly owned subsidiary of Isle of Man Enterprises plc, until Tesco announced its purchase of the business on 9 October 2023.
Criticism has been directed at Tesco from various groups, including national organisations, trade bodies, individuals, consumer groups and watchdogs, particularly since the early 2000s.
Tesco Town is British slang for an area where one retailer has large market share. Although the term references the Tesco chain of stores, it can be used to describe any area dominated by one particular retailer.
In the United Kingdom, it is common practice for retailers to have their own value brand in an effort to compete on price. These brands have become more popular in the UK with shoppers since the Great Recession caused food prices to rise.
Express pricing is a form of price discrimination where, in a reverse of economies of scale, retailers raise their prices slightly in smaller stores. The name of it originates from Tesco Express, but it can be used to apply to any retailer operating a similar policy. A 2018 Inside Out investigation found that some Express prices were 178% more than their non-Express counterparts. According to Sainsbury's, this can be attributed to discrepancies in "operational requirements and running costs. Rents, for example", it being "more of a challenge to deliver products to our local stores" and "other factors such as staffing, local rates and a focus on convenience products".
A dark store is a retail outlet or distribution centre that exists exclusively for online shopping. A dark store is generally a large warehouse that can either be used to facilitate a "click-and-collect" service, where a customer collects an item they have ordered online, or as an order fulfillment platform for online sales. The format was initiated in the United Kingdom, and its popularity has also spread to France followed by the rest of the European Union and Russia, as well as to the United States.
Christine Mary Tacon CBE is a British government administrator. Tacon was the United Kingdom's first Groceries Code Adjudicator.
The Groceries Market Investigation Order 2009 is a statutory instrument of the Parliament of the United Kingdom.
