Tesco.coms Success and Consumer Buying Behavior on the Internet.
With 2,291 stores, nearly 37 million square feet of selling space and 296,000 employees, (“Company overview”, 2004) (See Fig. 1) there’s little doubt that Tesco is a leading international retailer. The company that started as a one-shop grocer now offers a wide variety of food and non-food items, from fine wines and organic vegetables to financial services and telecommunications. One of their most innovative additions to the Tesco strategy was the introduction on online grocery shopping, but with increasing competition, have sales improved for Tesco since the implementation of Tesco.com? And, in general, how has consumer behavior changed with the advent of online shopping?
This paper will review several factors that have influenced whether or not Tesco has been successful in online retailing. To better understand the organization, an overview of the company will be given first, including the history of Tesco, as well as their corporate strategies and mission statement. A review of pertinent literature will follow, including research on the online grocery industry as a whole and news accounts specifically relating to Tesco. A review of financial data will be presented and then analyzed and a discussion will be had on the findings to support or dismiss the hypothesis that Tesco.com is indeed profitable and has a bright future ahead of it. A literature review and discussion will be conducted on the topic of general changes in consumer buying behavior, thanks to the Internet.
