Aldi’s Growing Market Share in the UK Grocery Sector
German-headquartered discount grocer Aldi, the UK’s fifth-largest supermarket, has seen its market share increase since it launched in the UK in 1990. New figures from data, insights and consulting company Kantar show that the grocer saw a 10.6% year-on-year rush in sales to May 2019, seeing it attain a new record high market share of 8%, an increase from 7.3% during the same period last year.
Aldi’s market share has increased substantially since January 2015; it is now only 2.3% points away from being the fourth biggest supermarket in the UK and overtaking supermarket giant Morrison which currently has a market share of 10.3%.
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In Kantar’s UK grocery market update in June of this year it revealed that Aldi attracted an additional 883,000 shoppers during the 12-week period to June 2019 with sales up 9.3% helping the retailer’s market share grow to 7.9%, which is up 0.5 percentage points compared with the same period last year, with Kantar finding that almost one million more households visited Aldi compared with last year.
In July 2019 Aldi was voted Britain’s favourite supermarket at the Good Housekeeping Food Awards 2019, as well as being crowned favourite wine retailer. These awards followed Aldi’s recent Best Grocer win at the Retail Week Awards.
Beating its competitors M&S, Sainsbury’s and Tesco, Aldi overtook Co-op in 2017 to become Britain’s fifth-biggest supermarket.
Aldi managing director of corporate buying at Aldi Julie Ashfield said: “We’re delighted to have been voted the UK’s Favourite Supermarket and Wine Retailer at the Good Housekeeping Food Awards. To have this decided by the British public is a real testament to the hard work we put in to provide our customers with a fantastic shopping experience. Above everything, we’re committed to providing customers with high-quality products at amazing prices and it’s great to see this resonating with our shoppers.”
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By GlobalDataWhat has Aldi done to achieve market share growth?
Aldi has over 830 stores in the UK and is hoping to operate over 1,200 by 2025. It plans to open 130 stores in the UK over the next two years taking it closer to its intermediate target of 1,000 stores by 2022.
Aldi announced in June plans to open 21 stores across the UK in the next three months, a week after announcing it will open seven new ‘local’ stores in London.
Supermarket sustainability
As consumers around the world are becoming more aware of the effects their retails choices on the planet, supermarkets with sustainability incorporated into their policies attract more custom. The Aldi Corporate Responsibility programme actively works to reduce food waste, support natural disaster relief efforts and build stronger communities through a partnership with Feeding America.
In April this year, Aldi committed to making 100% of its product packaging reusable, recyclable or compostable by 2025, and in July 2018 Aldi partnered with How2Recycle a standardised labelling system to encourage its customers to recycle.
Aldi US CEO Jason Hart said: “Aldi has never offered single-use plastic shopping bags. And while we’re pleased that we’ve helped keep billions of plastic grocery bags out of landfills and oceans, we want to continue to do more.
“The commitments we’re making to reduce plastic packaging waste are an investment in our collective future that we are proud to make.”
Low prices
Aldi was named the UK’s lowest-priced supermarket by trade magazine The Grocer in June this year.
The analysis showed that shoppers could save £4.47 on a basket of 33 everyday items at Aldi compared with its nearest priced competitor Asda and £18.22 compared with its most expensive competitor Waitrose.
Aldi managing director of buying Julie Ashfield said: “This result shows that yet again we are Britain’s lowest-priced supermarket, which is a key reason why more than a million new shoppers have switched to Aldi from more expensive supermarkets during the last 12 months.
“We’re continuing to work hard to keep prices low for our customers, as well as expanding our store network to reach even more shoppers.”
