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TTT, and others. Tesco is one of our most high profile companies and employs 10,000's of people. If it is difficulty, and it is, then it should be of concern to everybody.
One of the main problems with Supermarkets in general, and Tesco in particular, is that we simply have too many of them now. They have proliferated over the years to the position we have today, where they seem to be on every street corner and every roundabout. In my home town of Swansea and its immediate environs, we have 10 Tesco, 4 Asda, 2 Sainsburys, a huge Morrisons and countless other stores, all trying to sell us our daily bread. We also have at least 6 Lidls or Aldis. Is it any wonder that they are all struggling to get at our money ? Morrisons is also struggling and has been for longer than Tesco's present problems.
Tesco simply built too many stores over the last 10 years or so. They were greedy and naive. And according to the news this morning on The Today Program, they no longer come top in the cheapest food lists. To quote from the BBC this morning ::
"Tesco is the most significant victim of a huge structural change in the UK retail sector - online shopping; the breakdown of the Big Four's dominant position and customers who want smaller, daily top-up shopping. Many believe that a permanently smaller, less profitable Tesco is now a stark reality"
It was also said that that if Tesco didn't have its home delivery service, they would be in even deeper trouble. How many of us had a groceries delivered to our own home, by a refrigerated van 10 years ago ?
I comfortably predict that Tesco will have no option but to sell some of its sites to their rivals. Asda is now owned by the worlds biggest retailer, Walmart, and they would seem to be in prime position to pounce.