Tesco’s year-round offer to have five fresh produce lines on a half-price ticket in its stores continuously has certainly gleaned its fair share of column inches. The high-profile accompanying TV ads drew the attention of both the national and trade media.

If pricing structure and policy in this sector are ever taken on as the subject of a PhD, the researcher will probably conclude that they are merely a modern-day extension of the structure and policy that has been part of the retail armoury since long before the multiples came onto the scene.

The big difference now is that these things are monitored constantly by the big battalions as they fight each other for every last percentage point of market share potential. Pricing has become a science affecting the chain that leads from share price through to the supermarkets’ relationships with suppliers, rather more than a subject of occasional interest for academics and journalists.

Competition has, of course, always existed and even if the independent retail sector has all but evaporated in some conurbations, the strategy of the big guns still has an impact on the remaining high street shops, as well as street markets, country stores and farm shops.

Because of the seasonal nature of fresh fruit and vegetables, pricing and price-cutting have never been clear-cut. Unlike a tin of beans, fresh produce can be different shapes, of variable “quality” according to the skills and location of the producer, and in volume terms be subject to large fluctuations in availability thanks to the vagaries of the climate. How do you allow for that in prices that are often decided months in advance?

I have always had the greatest respect for traditional fruiterers who when buying on the markets and faced with a wholesale price fluctuation could, with the ease of a darts player calculating a three-dart finish, respond to the impact that any new set of circumstances had on their endgame by conjuring up a retail ticket that still represented value for money for all parties.

Making those decisions in the distant past was arguably far more complex than today, for apart from a wider range of fruit counts from which to choose, translating cartons into net weights was also part of the skill, as many countries packed to different dimensions. It was even accepted that “standardised” nets of cabbage varied according to the variety.

When independent fruit operators made up a sizeable share of the cake, there was plenty of room for everyone to manoeuvre.

However, I am reminded of a trip to Israel 25 years ago, when - coincidentally - a Tesco citrus buyer predicted to general bemusement that everything would get tougher, and that winning an additional one per cent of sales would ultimately become very hard work. How right he proved to be.

In my opinion, the spat we have all been interested witnesses to this week illustrates that, in fact, nothing much has changed. We may all believe that we live in far more sophisticated times, but the reality is pricing decisions are still being taken to make the job a good’un and ensure a level of return across the financial year that turns a profit to the retailer.

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