Tesco does it again - meh

krappyrubsnif

Tesco on SGR has just moved *everything* about again. If you are looking for many common things like pasta or herbs or almost everything else you will need to search for them and if you are looking for a niche 'ingredient' (like ancho chillies, say) you might as well give up. Do any of the retail experts here know why supermarkets do this? One theory is that they 'refresh' like this to make customers walk all round the store, thus buying more. If anyone from Tesco is reading this, please be aware that I am now much more likely to shop elsewhere and will be buying *less*. It also looks like some ranges are being dumbed down. The pasta range used for example to include good quality De Cecco or Del Verde pasta, known as among the finest in Italy, often on special offer - now it's all inferior brands or Tesco own-brand. Another reason not to go.

gardener-joe

...

miss annie

Never worked in food retail but shops move things around for a variety of reasons. Seasonal moves - moving the shop around to make space for Christmas, Easter, Valentines gift areas. Range moves - when you need to expand a product group, let's say pasta for the sake of argument, but there's no space to expand where the product currently lives so you have to find a bigger space and play musical chairs with everything else. Increase footfall moves - strategically moving something that's in high demand to area that requires customer to walk past stuff you'd like them to buy but they wouldn't otherwise see. For example, bread is generally in the furthest away corner from the doors so that you have to pass a lot of other products to get to it. There are other reasons but they are the most common in most kinds of retail.

HolbornFox

@miss annie is it also true that in retail they employ psychologists to work out exactly what someone looking at a certain level or spot may mean and then put something there to trigger an emotional response, subliminally making us buy 10 packets of biscuits?

Ali

I would by 10 packets of Tunnocks Carmel wafers any day of the week !

miss annie

Yes, in massive chains like Tesco, Sainsburys, Boots. Not where I work though, we try to work out what our customers might like to see and then put other things they might like and might not have discovered yet nearby. Not that complicated.

quince

Tesco are cutting their product range by 30%, so they'll most likely be rearranging the remaining stuff to cover the gaps caused by removing all the things that people actually want...

miss annie

They'll be putting Christmas out next month and will need the space for all of the seasonal lines and hundreds of £5 tins of Quality Street.

Ali

Quince why would Tesco remove items that people actually want?

That would be daft from a commercial sense!

south_to_north

As much as some people like de cecco pasta, I imagine quite a few tesco customers couldn't care less.... It's a tough time for supermarkets atm so I think they're trying to get rid of products that have a low margin and hope that the "put-off" factor as described by @krappyrubsnif doesn't outweigh the benefit.

krappyrubsnif

Reply from Tesco on Twitter: _"I'm sorry about this & I understand your frustration. We've made changes to how we set things out in our stores. Products will be grouped together based on how they are used by our customers and not how we classify the products. There will be colleagues to help & we'll also have stands in aisles to direct customers to the items that have moved. I hope this helps and f you have any further questions please let me know."_ Well, I didn't really think this explained *why* they are doing it, so I asked again - to which I got this response: _By making these changes we have freed up a little more space for our customer to try new dishes. Also increase the healthier options for our health conscious customers & expand the popular Free From ranges._ Make of that what you will.

Ali

Team Owen seem to be at the centre of empire outside Tescos canvassing. Does anyone have any ideas where I can buy Masaman curry paste. I wanted to try a new dish but couldn't fi d it in Tesco.

HolbornFox

You could try the Chinese shop on seven sisters.

Ilovegreyhounds

Mind shop already has Christmas cards out!

krappyrubsnif

Can you make it? Curry is only a mixture of the spices that are in it. Let us know when you're Don and we'll pop round.

Ali

Tesco have just let us try something new. We a fly in the soup ! A waspy looking thing in the finest tomatoe and lentil soup. Off to see the manger shortly

TheMimsy

@ Ali
I saw some at Morrison's Nags Head

Ali

The fly was presented to the customer service lady and a form filled in. It is now of to head office and the manufacturer

quince

Well, the Tesco people look at Lidl and Aldi and see, say, 1 brand of coconut milk which is situated in on one shelf, in one part of the store. The SGR Tesxo, which I assume is a pretty average example (and actually better than some, hard as it may be to believe), stocks no fewer than 8 different kinds, all in different places. Dunn's River? In the Caribbean section. Blue Dragon? In the Asian section. Tesco own brand? Wherever... From a consumer's point of view, this is good. Some brands are better than others, some are much cheaper. From Tesco's point of view, this is barking - less shelf space for higher margin goods, more space needed in the warehouse, more complicated logistics to keep up stock levels... So they'll concentrate more on the stuff they want to sell you, rather than offer you a greater choice. Suppliers who'll give them better deals/have had their necks wrung/are happy not to have their invoices paid for x months. As KRS notes, another reason not to go.

Ali

Do other supermarkets not do the same. I see that Lidl now has lits if self checkouts with only three manned ones. That must be quite a staff reduction they have achieved

krappyrubsnif

Oddly enough I noticed the coconut milk the other day. They are all still there scattered round the store. Basically, a dog's breakfast.

kreuzkav

Tesco is an ultra captialist supermarket that tries to make the most off lower prices. Saying that most of the workers there seem to have been there for 20 years.

miss annie

All supermarkets do the same, with the possible exception of Waitrose - how else do you imagine that you pay less in every supermarket for your milk than it costs to produce it.. Boots and Asda would be your best examples of ultra capilist retailers (if there is such a thing as ultra capitalism), being owned by Walgreens and Wamart.

Ali

Is ASDA not the ultra capitalist supermarket being part of Walmart. People complain about Tesco if it shut in SGR what would people think of that? It izxizx asbout 20% cheaper thgthgat the two Saintsbury's stores

miss annie

@Ali, are you drunk? You seem to be writing in gibberish.

quince

I developed a minor obsession with the coconut milk in the SGR Tesco and went around the entire store systematically counting how many different varieties they stocked. BTW, they always used to have a massaman curry paste, up the far end of the shop where the nuts and gluten free stuff resided.