Great 'disguised Own Brand' Hunt.

Clio_10

I haven't read all 56 pages (yet!!!) so forgive me if this is a repeat but own brand medicines like paracetamol and Ibuprofen have the same medicinal properties as the branded versions. The only differences tend to be the packaging and sometimes the carrier that is used, ie the plastic capsule or sugar coating.

Also, Avon do not test on animals and their make-up range is fab! They sell the best mascara I have found yet!

I used to work for a large pharmacy chain and I currently sell Avon products to help with the monthly bills!

supermarket_buyer

I worked as a supermarket buyer for many years Sainsburys and Asda I covered most areas and ended up Director Fresh Foods Asda I am now out of it and doing something completely different.

Apart from The very top brands eg Kellogs and Heinz most branded manufacturers make "Private label" for supermarkets The philosophy being that if we don't then somebody else will. Some brands will protect their brand by not passing on the latest branded innovation onto the supermarket until a period of time has passed e.g Branded Toothpaste,OTC medicines. A quick aside on OTC medicines you can check if the PL is the Brand by looking at the product license agreement number of the product which has to be displayed.

When it comes to manufacturing the vast majority of private label lines on items that are are driven through in bulk are the same A good example would be a standard white loaf. In a process like this all PL lines and the brand are the same. Time is money and it is all about taking complexity out of the process. In this country there are only two Bakers Allied and British Mothers pride and Sunblest. To my knowledge Warburtons do not make PL

It is a basic truth that PL is more profitable

The placement of product is "Merchandising for Profit" and that is basically placing larger displays of high margin lines at eye level and less profitable lower down This is also acheived with packaging where COD ( cheapest on display) lines are given low shelf stand out. A lot of COD lines are there to cover price comparisons in Shopping baskets i.e the store has the offering The truth is they do not want to sell it It is all about creating a value image without losing profit. I know this has been covered but work hard at looking for products e'g Value Bananas are ALWAYS on the bottom shelf A banana is a banana. At Asda we had Banana lines because bananas are the fastest moving food line in any supermarket The line was to create a Halo effect of value around the whole section LOts of jargon I know

I could go on but the basic principle is not to be lazy when shopping Look at the shelf edge labels pence per mill etc Commodities such as rice flour etc are pretty similar Another tip is never food shop when you are hungry You will put a lot more face filler in your basket

Do what your granny does and make a list and stick to it

24ctu_2

Children's wooden train tracks sold by BRIO are exactly the same as those sold by a lesser-known company called Big Jigs - just packaged in boxes by BRIO and plastic by Big Jigs, and it's well under half the price if you buy from Big Jigs.

Worth knowing if you're building up a train set for the kids!

stamford

Post 1117 very interesting one of the best on here for a while - I look forward to more inside info :T

stamford

rainbowandbubbles wrote: »

Carlsberg produce asda smart price beer, I work within.

Recent dirty trick by Asda on this reasonably swillable session beer - it's still a bargain £0.92 per 4 cans but they have slashed the alcohol from 3% to 2%. Shandy is looking a better option

jinger_2

Hubby and I used to work for a local frozen veg factory. You know the premium veg ranges (ie Birds Eye) that state their peas are field to frozen in 2.5 hours? Well so are your mid range and Value ones - they all come out of the same fields at the same time. They're washed, blanched and frozen at the same time. It's only when it comes to packing time that they're sorted into sizes (marrowfat/garden/petit pois - although some growers of peas use varieties that are size-specific nowadays) colour-sorted to get rid of khaki coloured/spotty ones and anything that isn't a pea, and checked for (damn, can't remember the technical term) 'softness' ie nice tasty ones for premium/mid-range brands to peas only good enough for pea-shooters (Asda Smart Price ones spring to mind!).

With veg like cauli or broccoli/calabrese the difference between brands is usually the size of the florettes.

As far as frozen veg goes, the mid-range stuff is not that different to the premium brands in taste or quality - the only major difference is the price. It's only when you look at the value ones that you notice very slight discolourations and/or blemished veg, also a few stems or stalks occasionally.

Schamansky

parahandy wrote: »

The following whiskies are bottled by Glenmorangie

snip

What about Aldi's Highland Earl and Highland Black?
Isn't "Alistair Graham" a distribution veil for Glenmorangie?

abi6882

One summer holiday at uni i worked for a factory that made all turtle and car plan products including T-cut. Most own brand and cheap versions of t-cut are actual t-cut but with just different packaging. that goes for a lot of shampoos and wax. The stuff you can buy in homebargains etc.. is made from them.

Ms-Pacman

Changing the subject to clothes, I once collected a load of sample clothes from a company in StAlbans about 3 - 4 years ago - I think they were called momentum clothing. It was samples of items being sold to different companies with things like popular kids characters like barbie, etc.
The same products had labels on like, boots own , ladybird, asda, next ( I was surprised at this one), i think m&s, and loads more that I can't remember. We sold the samples at a charity shop

The clothes were really cute and I remember seeing them in shops and thinking all different prices but all the same things!

Catster77

http://dnn.ethicalconsumer.org/

This site is quite useful, they review alot of items for quality and value for money, so at least you can get what you pay for.


On the topic of white goods/appliances I used to work in that field and visited factories in Italy and Germany (Smeg & Bosch) Bosch make alot of other branded goods.

In particular there are only 3 dishwasher manufactuers in Europe as the parts are quite complex.. I can't remember which but I think Whirlpool, Miele & Bosch.

Smeg is a very well known brand who do a 'cucina' range (still with the Smeg logo however) which is much cheaper, it doesn't look as gorgeous and doesn't have all the fancy features but I used to sell it to folk who wanted a 'name' without the pricetag, the integrated dishwasher is superb and much cheaper! Oh they also make the MFI 'Diplomat' range

Our local Bosch distributer (Lisburn N.Ireland) also used to do great deals on Bosch 2nd's which are also worth checking out, sometimes they only had a little scratch or a dent, sometimes had a new part fitted etc etc... always worth a try anyway!

I would also reccommend no-one ever buy Whirlpool the company are completely irresponsible and have the worst customer service ever. My opinion is based on selling their 'goods' (should read 'bads') customer feedback and complaints including one very serious incident involving a faulty gas hob! If you have a Whirlpool product and have a fault its a nightmare to get anyone who can fix it!