Activity 8: Comparing Supermarkets

These are the top supermarkets in the UK:

Aldi

Asda

Co-op

Iceland

Morrison's 

Sainsburry's 

Tesco 

Waitrose 

All of the above offer different services and quality of food, at different price levels, I will be comparing a few of these and giving my opinion on the best quality and best price.

Quality of service:

Tesco: From past experience I can confirm that Tesco's quality of service isn't as good as it could be, the staff didn't seem so helpful in helping me find what I was looking for, this and the extremely slow and unreliable self-service machines I can say that quality of service isn't Tesco's strong point.

Co-op: Co-op go through special measures when selecting staff, they make sure they are able to work with people and help them in any way they can, this shows as the quality of service is extremely good here, I had no problems with finding items and it was a generally good shopping environment.

Asda: They seem to have the same problems as Tesco face, they don't try and create a friendly environment for shoppers as their primary focus is on cheap prices, not such a good shopping environment as staff there aren't particularly helpful.

Waitrose: By far the best in my opinion, the staff here are friendly and know the shop well so are extremely helpful when you need to find something, they are always willing to help and I've never had to wait more than a minute for them to find an item for me.

Quality of food:

Tesco: There has been a lot of controversy in the past few weeks regarding their quality of food, more accurately the quality of their beef, it has been found that in some cases over 90% of the meat is in fact horse meat. many have speculated that it is not necessarily Tesco's fault, but I shall discus the general quality of the food in general. In short the food quality isn't very good, but what do you expect on such a low price range? The animals weren't free range and the meat just doesn't taste as good as in other stores. I'd be much happier spending a little bit more for better quality food.

Co-op: Quality of food here is very good, they make sure all the animals were free range and treated well. They also make sure that most of the food they sell is organic and take special measures for their fair trade goods.

Asda: Same as Tesco in that the quality of food here just isn't up to a good standard, the animals aren't free range and in all probability they weren't treated fairly when they were alive, so I wouldn't recommend shopping here for meat in particular, although this is only for their own brand, they do sell very high quality meat, just at a higher price.

Waitrose: Once again I would say that Waitrose have the upper hand when it comes to quality of food, All the meat they sell is free range and their product range has been praised for the quality. I would recommend shopping here if you don't mind spending a little more, which brings us onto the next comparison.

Pricing:

Tesco: In my opinion Tesco are by far the best with pricing, not only their own products, but branded products are also extremely cheap, far cheaper than most other supermarkets.

Co-op: The co-op offer fair prices for branded products and their own, their prices are still good, although around 10% higher than Tesco's, although some would say that a 10% increase in price is worth it considering they work using fair trade.

Asda: Similar prices to Tesco, although many of the branded products do not match the cheap prices of Tesco, Although in most cases the price difference is only a few pennies.

Waitrose: This is definitely Waitrose's weak point, their own products are of quite high prices, given the quality this makes sense, but many of the branded products are significantly higher value than in other stores. I'd only recommend Waitrose for their own products.

Comparison of websites.

Every major supermarket has their own website, I will compare a few of these.

Tesco:

 Tesco's online store is very easy to use and is simple and attractive, it gives all the information you will need and tells the user what sales they have on, the website allows users to order their products online as well as giving them information about the store, you are able to send them complaints over email and comments about their service are accepted.Overall the website was good to use and felt very well made. Once complaint I could make would be that the page doesn't fit the width of the browser window, which is why there are two white bars on the side of the screen, but this is a minor complaint.

Co-op:

 The co-op website is very good at giving information, but you aren't able to order online, their website is solely there to show you what they do and inform you of their quality and ethics to the people to supply their goods, the website tells you about many of their other services that they offer.

Waitrose:

 Waitrose's website is in my opinion the nicest looking out of them all, as well as that it also offers you the ability to shop online and will give you free delivery if you spend more than £50, it also gives you information about the history of the store, and also recipes are offered on the site for free. The site is extremely easy to navigate and is also very fast to load. Offers are shown on the front page so people don't miss out.

Asda:

The website certainly does it's job which is to allow people to shop online, although in my opinion the website lacks visual appeal. The colours and the advertisements just make the website not look as good as it's competition. Although it does give the user all the latest information about in store sales and the online purchase system is very easy to use. It also gives a lot of detail about the store and the services they offer.