The Battleship Waitrose?

[Hypognosis]

Well, in an effort to out-compete other supermarket chains, they seem to have blown something a lot closer to home out of the water...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-beds-bucks-herts-24157275

Do you think that this shop stands a chance of winning its case?

Would this behaviour put you off starting your own retail business, given that most supermarkets these days are "a high street in a box"?

(And they only pay one dose of business rates per box, too. There's fair for you).

[woofgang]

I wonder if the coffee shop is one of those that has papers you can read....I wonder if the local newsagent is happy about that?

[FredPuli43]

No chance. He might have a case if Waitrose gave free coffee to everyone. As it is, he could always have his own loyalty scheme and give a free coffee to his best customers, as Waitrose do.

[VHG]

>>>>he could always have his own loyalty scheme and give a free coffee to his best customers

But his income COMES from selling the coffee, its his man sales item. If he gives it away for free he makes far less money.

Waitrose can give coffee away for free because they make all their income from all the other products people buy.

As usual supermarkets care little for local shops and in fact between them they have the ambition to drive all small retailers out of business.

[boxtops]

I understand where he's coming from. Waitrose is on my way to work and nearly everyone has jumped on the bandwagon and got a loyalty card, so we get our free coffee on the way to the office. We rarely buy anything else in the shop. Mind you, if it wasn't free, I wouldn't go somewhere else for it - I'd just wait and make a coffee in the office if Waitrose wasn't there.

[Gromit]

IKEA also offer free drinks to their loyalty card holders, has done for a couple of years.
I guess this man is just unlucky that his business is near to Waitros.

[Hypognosis]

@woofgang

I take your point but it is actually the Waitrose representative speaking, where it says "we provide our customers with free coffee, newspapers and other offers..."

So they're driving the nearest newsagents into the ground, as well, by the look of it.

I am all for a competitive marketplace but, clearly, some participants have deeper pockets than others and can just muscle other contestants out of their way.

I cannot help wondering how many unemployed have contemplated setting up their own small business for a while before the realisation dawns that they haven't got a hope, against this sort of thing.

Would I be wrong in thinking that a big chunk of the cost savings (ie profits) that centralisation delivers to the big supermarket chains would, a few decades ago, have been spent on the wages of several thousand high-street shopkeepers?

We love that we pay less for our weekly shopping -and- moan about the unemployed but it never occurs to us that there may be a connection there.

[Hypognosis]

@boxtops

Crafty!

// Mind you, if it wasn't free, I wouldn't go somewhere else for it - I'd just wait and make a coffee in the office if Waitrose wasn't there. //

I do sometimes wonder how coffee shops ever manage to generate a customer base, given that you can buy a jar of instant for the price of one cup in a coffee house.

Coffee afficionados will be cringing, at the thought of instant, I expect. ;-)

[youngmafbog]

Well since he reckons his business has lost 40% clearly he was heavily relying on Waitrose do pull customers so he could have the passing trade in the past.

Always a difficult one this, having been in the retail trade, both for a large supermarket and as a sole trader on the high street I can appreciate the problems from both sides. I'm afraid it is just one of those things.

[B00]

2 quid for a normal coffee? Is that the going Wow!

[mikey4444]

Supermarkets have changed the way we shop and they aren't going to away any time soon. How many people would really swop the convenience of a large shop, with lots of parking that sells pretty well everything, for traipsing all over town, dragging their shopping behind them ?

If some people think that we can go back to some golden period of British High Street life, like the 1950's, where ladies went shopping everyday, using those wicker baskets, all waving cheerfully at the butcher, the baker and the candlestick maker, they are sadly misguided. The reason that my Mother did that sort of thing was that she didn't work, and we didn't have a fridge, let alone a freezer.

Tesco didn't start the decimation of the High Street. What about all those small shops that Mr Selfridge put out of business when he opened his huge shop in the West End ?

I feel sorry for this chap but does he seriously think that Waitrose will close down, just to allow him to continue trading ?

[B00]

don't think he wants 'em to close down, just stop giving free coffee.

[boxtops]

They've been doing it for ages, though - I think I got my loyalty card in something like January this year - how come he's only just noticed?