Growing Consumer Satisfaction with Food Pricing

By Mintel | 18 September 2000

A new report from Mintel highlights an optimistic future for today's food consumers, with over 50% of adults seeing an improvement to supermarket value for money.Latest research from Mintel shows growing consumer satisfaction with value for money by Britain's major food retailers. British consumers have benefited from lower prices on many items, as a result of downward pressure on prices from Asda/Wal-Mart and the investigation carried out by The Competition Commission.Tesco continues to gain favour, while loyalty cards suffer a downward trend in the popularity stakes.Value for money - growing consumer satisfaction Encouragingly Mintel's research reveals that today's British consumer is increasingly satisfied with the value for money offered by major multiples. Of the 992 adults questioned, 53% agreed that the food at the supermarket where they did their main shopping is better value for money now than 12 months ago.Those in the North West appear most satisfied with pricing while those in the South are the most likely to disagree that shopping is better value for money.Agreement was highest among shoppers at Asda (69%) and Morrison (61%), while 55% of Tesco shoppers and 47% of Sainsbury's shoppers believed they were getting more for their money."Overall, Britain's shoppers feel more satisfied with pricing than 12 months ago. In fact only 10% of adults felt that food was not better value for money than 12 months ago" comments Richard Caines, Retail Consultant.Somewhat surprisingly, store size presents a greater problem for today's British shoppers - with those most put off by large stores seeking out smaller grocers.While an average of 43% of adults find some supermarkets too big, this peaks to 53% of those aged 65 plus. "The fact that today's Britons are satisfied with food pricing reflects the drop in real prices for many food items over the past 12 months" comments Richard Caines.