Waitrose PYOO (“pick your own offers”) ups game in supermarket price wars with Aldi, Lidl and big four
Middle England favourite Waitrose has upped the stakes in the supermarket price wars with what it's calling "game-changing" discounts.
The latest salvo in the battle with Aldi, Lidl and the big four – and adding a new acronym to our lingo almost as good as BOGOF – is "Pick Your Own Offers", or PYOO, which is giving customers the freedom to apply discounts to items of their choice.
"This is a ground-breaking move giving customers the power to choose the offers they want," claimed Waitrose managing director Mark Price. "We know from the success of myWaitrose that customers like straightforward deals they can trust that are relevant to them. Pick Your Own Offers goes one step further by putting them in control."
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Waitrose customers who are part of its myWaitorse loyalty scheme will be able to get a 20 per cent discount on 10 items from a free choice of around 1,000 items, every time they shop. It also includes items that are already price matched against Tesco as well as ones which are already part of other store promotions.
Items will include branded products from Birds Eye and McVitie's as well as lines in its essentials and premium own brand range.
Retail analyst Clive Black, called it an "inspirational" move by Waitrose.
"Clearly, in trying the personalised promotions to myWaitrose shoppers only, the retailer is seeking to effectively manage the cost of this initiative. That said, we believe that this is quite an inspirational move by management that could strike accord with its shoppers and, perhaps, non-loyalists too; so there could be a spike up in myWaitrose membership."
Around 70 per cent of Waitrose's five million customers use a myWaitrose card.
PYOO, "strikes head on" the confusion surrounding supermarket deals and whether they really area a good deal, said Black – something that has only helped the straightforward discounters.
"Indeed, we have asserted for some time that many shoppers have mistrusted the pricing and promotional strategies of the 'Big Four' superstore groups and other industry participants for many years. Such an outcome has been very damaging to the reputations of the major players, to a great extent reflecting how supplier driven they had become," said Black.
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Price added: "Different forms of personalised marketing have been around since the 1990s, but we’re introducing mass customisation in grocery. Customers can choose what’s valuable to them when they shop for groceries. We really are giving power to the consumer."
The supermarket's aren't the only retailers trying to compete with the German discounters. Bargain Booze owner Conviviality Retail launched a new campaign with the tagline Aldi Shmaldi to promote rival prices.