Tesco: Keeping The Hard Discounters At Bay? Case Solution And Analysis, HBR Case Study Solution & Analysis of Harvard Case Studies

IMD-5-0737 © 2008
Koschat; Martin; Ryans; Adrian; Sequeira; Stephanie

This case can be used with Nestlé: The Growing Retail Role Of Hard Discounters Like Aldi (IMD-5-0736) and Nestlé: Leveraging The Difficult Discounter Station (IMD-5-0738) or independently. The case describes some of the important strategic and tactical moves that Tesco made between the early 1990s and 2005. Tesco is widely recognized as one of the most innovative and successful retailers on the planet. During the 15-year period it became the dominant supermarket retailer in the UK and the biggest retailer overall accounting for over 13% of all retail sales in the UK. It was quite successful during this interval in including both Asda (got by Wal Mart in 1999) and three of the important European difficult discounters.

The challenging discounters had a combined market share of less than 5%; more than 15 years after the first one entered the UK market. Learning objectives: The instance describes some of the strategy and tactics Tesco used to try and contain the hazard posed by strong; low cost competitors. Pupils and participants have a chance discuss their effectiveness and to identify some of the major moves. It becomes clear in the discussion that Tesco has responded in an extremely innovative way to its low cost adversaries. This results in a discussion about whether Tesco can continue to triumph as the hard discounters redouble their efforts and learn from some of their early mis steps.

Tesco Keeping The Hard Discounters At Bay case study solution

Subjects: Hard discounters; Retailing; Competitive strategy; Marketing strategy; Information technology; Loyalty program; Branding
Settings: United Kingdom; Retailing; £37 billion; 2005