Sainsbury’s unveils its ‘Next Level’ strategy at the Cobham Lab store, aiming to revolutionize customer shopping experiences in the UK.
- The strategy focuses on expanding food product availability across more stores, targeting volume growth.
- Innovative product presentation and layout changes are being tested to enhance the shopping mission for customers.
- A new checkout system and dedicated ‘Free From’ areas are among the trials underway at the Cobham store.
- Sainsbury’s aims for £1bn in cost savings by 2027 to finance better prices and pay.
Earlier this year, Sainsbury’s CEO Simon Roberts introduced the ambitious ‘Next Level’ strategy, intended to position Sainsbury’s as a preferred choice for food shoppers in the UK. A central component of this strategy is increasing the availability of Sainsbury’s complete food range. Currently, only 15% of its supermarkets offer the full selection, but plans are in motion to expand this across 180 stores.
The Cobham store in Surrey acts as a testing ground for the retailer’s innovative strategies, conducting over 100 experiments focused on improving customer experience. Enhanced space for food, a fresh store layout, and better product placement are all part of the initiative, including improvements such as placing frozen products alongside their fresh counterparts to streamline the shopping process.
One significant alteration is the introduction of a ‘fish counter on a wall’ concept, which maintains all available species of fish together at a lower cost, thus expanding the range. This has led to rapid growth in the category, as the larger selection attracts more customers.
To make shopping more intuitive, dedicated ‘Free From’ areas now consolidate products catering to dietary restrictions in a single location. Such layouts represent a significant shift in supermarket strategy, emphasizing customer needs over traditional product placement methods.
A modernized checkout experience is also under trial. The Cobham store offers Smart Shops and a new generation of hybrid checkouts, blending self-checkout features with traditional lanes. According to Roberts, this concept provides customers with greater flexibility, complementing the existing manned tills and aligning with consumer demands for a smoother checkout experience.
Sainsbury’s has bolstered its clothing offerings, refining styles and value to cater to shoppers who seek both groceries and appealing fashion. The store trials include touch-screen stations to aid customers in locating products and suggesting recipe ideas, further enhancing the in-store journey.
These innovations are part of broader cost-saving goals. Sainsbury’s plans to secure £1bn in savings by March 2027, on top of £1.3bn already saved, to enable price reductions for customers and better wages for employees. This focus on efficiency, from rearranged warehouses to inventive product stacking, underpins Sainsbury’s commitment to maintaining competitiveness.
The Cobham Lab store exemplifies Sainsbury’s forward-thinking approach, with customer experience at the forefront of its innovative retail strategy.
