Mark Kleinman: Every Lidl helps a new era of supermarket mergers
Mark Kleinman is Sky News’ City editor and the man who gets the Square Mile talking in his City AM column. Every Lidl helps a new era of supermarket mergers Every Lidl helps. For that matter, every Aldi does too. With apologies to the creators of Tesco’s famous advertising slogan, that might be the neatest way to encapsulate [...]
Every Lidl and Aldi help usher in a new era of supermarket mergers in Britain's grocery retail industry, writes Mark Kleinman, Sky News' City editor. This new chapter follows Tesco's attempted merger between Sainsbury's, Morrisons, and Asda, which was initially discussed earlier this year but later terminated by Sainsbury's. The impetus for a merger has strengthened due to food insecurity, rising employment costs, and pressure from ministers for UK competition regulators to be 'pro-growth.'
The emergence of discounters Aldi and Lidl has made a deal between two major players more plausible than when Sainsbury's and Asda tried to combine in 2018. Simon Roberts, Sainsbury's CEO, must revive a growth story to stay competitive against his rivals. Meanwhile, BT Group faces a complex situation after rescuing TalkTalk, a company with a challenging cost base and regulatory framework.
The UK government's request for a competition risk waiver was made at the last moment, and BT ultimately decided to purchase TalkTalk despite concerns about the deal.
Written by urgent.news from City AM's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
