The changing nature of UK grocery retailing

This paper gives an overview of the nature of grocery retailing in the UK and how this is changing. It discusses the price war of the late 1970s and how retailers developed added-value strategies over the 1980s to raise their profitability. Different formats such as superstores, supermarkets, convenience stores and discounters are discussed plus the dynamics of their competition. This competition between the various retail formats is then assessed in terms of the impact of the relationships between own brands, leading, secondary and tertiary brands.