Price rises

[brightncheerful]

We don't have any experience of what is happening to prices in other supermarkets and we don't buy any of the products that have been subject of recent price increase announcements.

Mrs Bnc (Waitrose where else) usually starts buying the basics and ingredients she needs for the Christmas/New Year fare after Armistice Day. This year at my suggestion she started buying several weeks ago to avoid what I reckon would be price rises in the run up to the Christmas period. The media tells us that prices will be going up in the New Year but why would a supermarket wait until the least busy time when they can get in now and take full advantage of the demand season.

Yesterday Mrs Bnc out shopping found that the shelves of the items she had bought already are now empty.

There is a remote possibility that Waitrose are reducing inventory, also that people whose home cooking skills are not up to much would be wanting plenty of time to experiment before the big day. But on balance I think buy before prices rise is the more likely explanation.

Would you agree?

[redsturgeon]

For many years we used to buy our meat for the Xmas period from a locally renowned butcher in the next town. I would order at the beginning of December, then on Xmas eve, drive over, queue with the other 50 or so people in the shop. Pick up our order, pay £100 or so to the dear old lady in the little window and load up the car (actually despite being £100 worth it wasn't that much...one big box.)

I remember when I used to spend Xmas at my in-laws and they used to spend the whole of December driving around Lincolnshire and Yorkshire (potatoes from a particular farm in Lincs along with sausages, ham from York etc, though they didn't go quite as far a Norfolk for the turkey) There seemed to be a great fear that one had to get the food in well before Xmas in case things ran out.

I think these two scenarios play to a time, long past when things may have indeed run out, if you did not get everything you needed well in advance you might go hungry!

Last year I drove Mrs RS into town, at 7.30 on Xmas eve, parked outside M&S and waited for 20 minutes while she bought everything we needed, paid and returned to the car. While she was there there were hardly any people doing any shopping but a large queue of people were waiting to pick up the food they had pre ordered. They were still waiting when she had finished.

I've heard that even in Russia these days, the era of queuing for food, ordering at one counter and paying at another, is gone!

Throughout our time here we have always bought our vegetables at the local farmer's market, that remains the case.

I have no idea if prices are going up and to be honest Mrs RS could not give a toss whether she spends £100, £110 or £150 in M&S on Xmas eve. Scrooge buying that huge turkey on Xmas day has a lot to answer for.

John

[midnightcatprowl]

I think the issue is much more complex than this:

Christmas sales are so critical for the retail sector (I speak with feeling as an ex shop owner) that shops won't chance customers going elsewhere over price issues. While some customers are faithful to one store and others have little or no choice, the majority of people in the UK have vast choice of places to shop. Adding to the choice is that even those who prefer to shop in person may well opt for delivery or click and collect when the shops start to get really busy;

Some people are, of course, 'rational' shoppers but the majority are not. One thing you quickly learn in retail is that people will go to great inconvenience to get a few pennies off X, while, once they are in the store, buying Y at an over the top price plus of course buying several other items they hadn't planned to purchase and which may meet neither their real needs nor their real desires. The thing is to get people into the shop in the first place and to get them coming back into it during the 'big spend' season;

Price rises in January are to some extent hidden behind the January SALES effect. People who feel they are getting bargains tend to focus on shopping for them and expending their energy on hunting for them and then their energies exhausted quickly pick up the ingredients for tonight's dinner with less focus on price;

Empty shelves in shop may not indicate that more people are buying. It can be poor prediction of sales by the store. It can be sudden changes in the weather - not just the obvious stuff like people buying gloves and scarves and soup instead of salad when the temperature suddenly drops or more salad and ice cream when it suddenly goes up - but the changes weather creates in whether people go out or stay in and this is often quite subtle e.g. really bad weather means many people may stay in, but what might have been expected to be a pleasant sunny day turning into a dull not so warm day may send people to the shops instead of to the theme park or the beach. Most shops - including and maybe especially the largest stores - are highly dependent on regular deliveries, a crash on the nearest motorway which holds up traffic quickly translates into shelves empty of certain items;

Filling up policies and staffing levels also have a big effect. If you are in the queue for the tills your heart will be gladdened by the call for all till trained staff to come to the check outs but if you are coming into the store as you hear that call you can be quite sure that some of the things you want will not be available on the shelves. Filling up policies in some stores are systematic rather than responsive and in really large stores given the walking distances and time taken to bring stock to the shop floor it may not be practical to have truly responsive filling up systems. Small shops have the most potential for really responsive filling up but this is often defeated by staff understanding/attitude and managerial understanding/attitude, for example 'being busy' is often prized above acting rationally. To act rationally staff must be allowed and encouraged to think and given the time in which to observe and think but in many stores only constant activity is valued regardless of whether the activity is worthwhile or not.