Morrisons is bringing back the Safeway brand for a wholesale range and opening ten new convenience stores
Morrisons is bringing back the Safeway brand, the supermarket announced today, as well as launching a new convenience store offering.
The Safeway brand is to be revived as a range for wholesale to independent retailers – Morrisons said the re-introduction of the brand will enable it to "leverage its sourcing and unique food maker skills to give independent retailers' customers access to great quality products".
The new range will be available from early next year.
(Source: Getty)
Safeway was originally launched in the UK as a subsidiary of a US brand, but was bought by Morrisons in 2004.
The UK group phased the brand out and the Safeway brand disappeared from the UK's high streets in 2005.
Meanwhile, the supermarket is also trialling convenience food offerings in ten petrol station shops owned by forecourt operator Rontec.
Four Morrisons Daily shops will open before Christmas and a further six will open in January, selling a combination of branded and Morrisons own brand products. Wholesale specialists Palmer & Harvey will run the logistics side of the new Morrisons Daily stores.
The new Morrisons Daily stores come just over one year after the group was forced to sell off the bulk of its convenience offering, M Local. The only M Local shops Morrisons retained were those located on forecourts.
"These are two capital light ways of growing in the convenience food market," said David Potts, Morrisons chief exec.
"By working with well-established partners and reviving the Safeway brand, we are making our products more accessible to more customers."
Rontec chair and chief executive Gerald Ronson said: "We are constantly looking for ways in which we can improve the service and product range we offer to our customers and are pleased to be working together with Morrisons on this pilot."
These new initiatives are the latest in a series of new deals and offerings announced by Morrisons – in the last month, the group has unveiled a new same-day delivery arrangement with Amazon, and just yesterday it cut petrol prices to below £1 per litre for certain customers.