UK grocery retailer Waitrose has reported that sales of its new 'essential Waitrose' discount range of products, made up of 1,400 items including apples, mandarins, blueberries, peppers and romaine lettuce, have pushed past the £100m (€118.4m) barrier in just three months.
The move to offer a discount range, which includes a number of existing products that have been repackaged and cut in price, has proved a success despite initial scepticism, according to a report in The Telegraph.
'We are building sales momentum and a lot of that is down to essentials,' said Richard Hodgson, commercial director at Waitrose. 'Yes, there was a lot of scepticism when we launched the range, from competitors and from our customers – but we have proved them wrong.'
Overall sales at Waitrose have jumped 4.3 per cent this year following a sharp slip at the end of 2008 – a result of customers opting for cheaper food at discount chains such as Aldi, Lidl and Netto – with much of that attributed to the introduction of the essential range in March.
The group is aiming for overall sales of £600m (€710.6m) over the course of 12 months, resulting in a budget line contribution of 15 per cent to annual sales.
Despite the success, analysts believe that Waitrose has some distance to cover before matching the results of Sainsbury's since its price reductions.
'Waitrose may have lowered prices with the essential range, but it just goes to show how expensive they were before,' Pali international analyst Nick Bubb told the publication. 'They are still lagging behind Morrisons and Sainsbury's.'
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