Unit 8 eCommerce: Analysis of Sainsbury's Promotional Materials Report

This report, prepared by Habibullah Tohin Aman, examines Sainsbury's operations, focusing on both their traditional brick-and-mortar stores and their online 'click' operations. The report provides an introduction to Sainsbury's history and core philosophy, highlighting their commitment to quality and value. It details the developments in their physical stores, including expansions in non-food items, self-checkouts, and the integration of the 'SmartShop' app and 'Food and Go' concepts. Furthermore, the report explores Sainsbury's efforts in sustainable practices, such as recycling and energy-efficient refrigeration. The analysis extends to Sainsbury's online presence, discussing the growth of their online grocery business, online fulfillment centers, and click-and-collect services. The report evaluates the effectiveness of both brick and click operations, emphasizing the company's investments in online development to meet the evolving needs of its customers and maintain a competitive edge in the retail market.

Habibullah Tohin Aman (1110556) AV Corp Promotional Materials TASK 1
Sainsbury’s
TASK 1.1
Introduction:
ainsbury’s is a large grocery company that woks in all the UK, it was founded by John
James Sainsbury in the 1869 with a shop managed by him and his wife (Mary Ann).The
shop was collocated in Drury Lane in London and their slogan (or as we can say the
philosophy of James) was that the product that they sold were with a good quality and
with a low price. The company was named as J. Sainsbury Limited as a private company in the 1922.
After that change the company was divided in sic departments dairy, bacon and hams, poultry and
game, cooked meats and fresh meats to give a better service to their customers.
TASK 1.2
Brick Operation
Sainsbury’s launched six trial shops in different part of the UK such as:
- Alperton in London
- Devizes in Wiltshire
- Emersons Green in Bristol
- Harpenden in Hertfordshire
- Morecambe in Lancashire
- Tamworth in Staffordshire
These shops have 3 important developments that are:
 Increasing of their popular “Tu” clothing range with the kitchen and homeware items to give
to the customers a larger choices of the non-food zone. Also, they have increased the space
of non-food items such as Tech (mobile phones and tablets), health and beauty, pharmacy,
homeware and clothing by 30% in these trial shop.
 To meet the needs of the customers Sainsbury’s has introduced a new self-checkouts that
allow customers with small trollies to buy their item other than using the basket self-
checkout. Also, they have integrated new app called “SmartShop” which allow the
customer to prepare their shopping list at home and then in the store with the help of this
app that shows to them the collocation of the items and that allow the customers to find
them quickly and buy them quickly by paying via mobile phone.
 The last thing that they have integrated is the “Food and Go” that consist to move the
bakery in front of the shop (closer to the checkouts) to give to the customers more fresh
items and move the frozen aisle closer to them to give the opportunity to the customer to
have a choice between them.
Another operation made by Sainsbury’s recently is to improve their fridge system by using
aerofoils a technology given by the “William Advanced Technology” used on the F1 cars that
improved the energy consummation of the fridges (aerofoils allow the fridge to keep the cold
into the fridge and not going out of it so less energy is wasted) of the Sainsbury’s shops. Basically
the cold air streams from holes in the top of the fridge cabinet to keep product cold and with the
new aerofoils the cold air is hold in the fridge so less cold air is wasted so Sainsbury’s can save
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Unit 8 - eCommerce

Habibullah Tohin Aman (1110556) AV Corp Promotional Materials TASK 1
energy on it and that means that they will spend less money to keep the fridges refrigerated.
Another operation related with the refrigeration, it is made by Sainsbury’s in collaboration with
a company called Geoscart to take the heat that is made from the refrigeration process in order
to transport it in an underground vault through a series of pipes and keep it underground using
subsurface rock (which has good insulating properties). The heat is pumped back into the store
when it is required and with whatever rate it is needed and this allow Sainsbury’s to cut store
heating bills.
Sainsbury’s is proud to be one of the fewest grocery shops that have started an operation about
recycling old crates to new one more efficient and made it with 100% recycled materials. The
operation consist on giving the old crates to a company called “Schoeller Allibert” that is the first
one in the UK that products goods by 100% recycled materials that meet the European Food
Safety Authority Standards that allow them to transport safety the foods.
TASK 1.3
Click Operation
Sainsbury’s first launched its online grocery business in 1999 and it has now grown to employ over
10,000 colleagues either in-store or as drivers, operating out of 214 stores across Britain. Some 96%
of UK postcodes are covered, with Sainsbury’s delivery drivers travelling 43 million miles last year
and delivering over 10.5 million items every week. (Saisbury's, 2013)
 In 2013, Sainsbury’s opened a large Online Fulfilment Centre in Bromley-by-Bow, East
London. The decision was based on the fact that Sainsbury’s was able to serve 20,000 more
customers than the usual 190,000 and also the statistics was good on online business for the
reason that every year the sales were 15% more that the last one. John Rudoe, the director
of Online, Digital and Cross-Channel said that they were working hard on giving the best
quality of services that they could provide to their customers and this operation can let them
growing online and maintain the service available for all the online customers.
 In 2014, they started to launch their first click and collect service that was based on
providing all the orders of the customer made before 1pm and give them the possibility to
collet it in one of the station such as:
- Oakwood
- Totteridge & Whetstone
- Woodside park
- Leytonstone
- Loughton
- Debden
- South Woodford
Although this service was efficient and secure for the customer that were using it, there was
a charge of £1.99 for collecting their items in one of the station that Sainsbury’s provide this
service. Also in the same year, they improved their website for the reason that every devices
such as smartphones and tablet could access to their website. Also they made easier for the
customer to search items by providing them a category list such as favourites and special
offers. All this improvements was made by the team directed by Jon Rudoe that was working
on this operation called “Behind the screen”.
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Habibullah Tohin Aman (1110556) AV Corp Promotional Materials TASK 1
TASK 1.4
Evaluation between the Brick Operation and the Click Operation
Sainsbury’s from the beginning was a company that used to sell their products on the shops, they
are not that developed on the internet such as like Amazon have for the reason that the company
that I mentioned have started from the beginning as an online shop. Even though Sainsbury’s is
more a brick shop, the company are investing money on their online website to provide the online
customers to have all the advantages and possibility to buy online products that Sainsbury’s can
offer to them. The last years Sainsbury’s have started quite a few operations about their online
development for the reason that every year their online customers are increasing and they make a
lot of profit on it so they are counting on the fact that if their website can meet all the requirement
that the customers need they can increase more the number of the user that buy from their
webpage. Although Sainsbury’s is making a lot of operations about the click stuff, they are still doing
operation about their brick operation as well such as the new shops that I mentioned above that can
increment the facilities of buying products from Sainsbury’s so they can use these shops to advertise
their self to acquire new customers. They are also doing stuff about recycling and refrigeration of the
fridge and that can help Sainsbury’s to spend less money on it and invest the money in other
operations in order to improve the company and become a better shop for their customers . My final
evaluation is that Sainsbury are doing nice development in both sides (brick and click operation) but
they are still doing a lot of operation more about the brick stuff instead of doing more operation on
the click one in order to make their website at level of the facilities and design of other companies
such as “Amazon” which offers more facilities about transport and orders.
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