OCADO's Tesco price match - Not always a good thing!

EAB2

Ocado, the company that deliver waitrose food, price match Tesco on many items.

This is usually a good thing, as you can get Waitrose products and name brands at Tesco's generally-lower-than-Waitrose-prices, delivered free. Whereas Tesco charge £5.99 for delivery.

I noticed when doing this week's shop, however, that Bertolli (olivio) spread has jumped from around £1.34 to £2.07! An increase of 54%!!

This is one of the products on the Tesco price match, so clearly Tesco has bumped its price up for some reason this week. But Waitrose's regular price, which Ocado would have charged before the Tesco price match, is around £1.55.

So in this case a Tesco price match is causing an increase of 33% to the price of the item.

I wonder how many other items they are sneakily including in the Tesco price match only when Tesco has bumped its prices for a week or two so that it can offer 'discounts' the next?!

Ed

Codswallop

Yes, I've noticed that too! I dearly love my Waitrose deliveries but I have started to make a list of all the products I buy and track the price from old bills. On some products, particularly organic products, they are trying to reap back their profits by increasing their price. I think they're doing this on selective products that customers have a relatively inelastic demand for.

It's been reported in the papers that Tesco are furious about Ocado trying to price match them. It could be possible that they're increasing the price of products like Bertoli that are less attractive to their generally more price conscious customers in the hope that it will put a spanner in the works for Waitrose. The Tesco customer might be offered an incentive to buy something very similar to Bertoli instore at a slashed price.

In the spirit of this forum and saving the £££s, I try to have a £2 limit for each product I buy in an Ocado delivery if I can or else it can get very expensive. Generally I'm opting for their quality protein, like chicken, eggs etc that I find do taste better than Tesco and I have little objection to paying more for. However, for soaps, washing liquid and loo rolls I'm sticking to good old Asda!

Codswallop

Just to clarify, my approx. £2 per item rule excludes the protein buys, I think that's quite hard to do in Waitrose! I'm talking about side dishes etc. I've also eliminated buying goods like Pizza Express pizzas which no matter how good they taste, are extortionate in price.

The answer to this pricing issue, might be to have 2 windows open at once when doing an Ocado delivery. One on the Tesco delivery page and the other on the Ocado. More time consuming, yes, but more revealing too about alternative offers to highly priced items.

Set yourself a weekly budget for the Ocado delivery and don't go above it.
If I do, I go back and whittle it down. High quality protein is a priority, then fruit and vegetables, however I won't pay £3 for a box of grapes, forget it.
After that, I focus on large containers of yoghurt rather than individual ones and filling items like cereals, breads, potatoes, pasta and sauce. What's left over can be spent on side dishes .

Since the credit crunch began, I've realised that I've become healthier because I've almost! eliminated puddings and sweet products that are often too high in price for their zero nutritional value. There are ways of keeping it low fat but delicious too.

EAB2

I now tend to have mysupermarket.co.uk open for things that we are being stitched up on price. For some reason their base price is tesco, but on bertolli spread for example if you click the product it shows asda selling it for £1.07. At discounts like that you only need a few products to be cheaper and I'll get the KVIs from asda and send the wife to waitrose for the meat!

There was a good article in the mail last week about how much you can save going to aldi and lidl. There arent any near me, but there is an ASDA and I wont be paying £2.07 for a tub of marge, so Ocado/Waitrose have some thinking to do.

Ed

Cheeky_Wee_Lassie

Sainsbury's did a similar cheeky Tesco Price Match where the price went UP. It was on their value fruit salad which used to be a snip at 15p, but then a big sticker went over the top of the original price proclaiming it was a Tesco Price Match.......but now it costs 25p.
I think it's pretty duplicitous, as the term price matching would probably encourage most customers to think they were getting a better price not a higher one!

jonsteel

Just to clarify you can use mySupermarket to shop from Tesco, Ocado, Sainsbury's and Asda. There isn't a base price - you pick a supermarket, and then compare between your chosen supermarket and the other three. You can compare the price of your whole trolley or a single item. Prices are updated daily.

Ocado's Tesco Price Match (as well as Tesco's Price Check) are updated on a weekly basis. mySupermarket is the only place you can get real time comparison.

EAB2

oh, the way i've used it is just type a product in the search box, I dont choose a supermarket

Codswallop

Thanks for the information about mysupermarket.co.uk

The subject of the next Dispatches programme is going to be on this very topic - supermarket food pricing, the advert suggested that some of the pricing tactics will be revealed. Next Monday, Channel 4 at 8pm.

EAB2

Thanks cods, I'll try to watch it