Disruptive Strategic Innovations by Main Competitors of Sainsbury’s

Disruptive innovation strategy is a kind of innovation that involves in creating a new market and the new customer value network. The well-known organizations of United Kingdom use this disruptive strategy to displace their competitors from the existing market and disrupt their customer value network (Kishna et al. 2017). This report deals with the approaches that will be taken by Sainsbury’s to show proper response against the disruptive strategy of their leading competitors. However, Tesco, Asda, Aldi and Morrison’s are the main competitors of Sainsbury’s in the retail market of UK (sainsburys.co.uk, 2017).

Delivering customer value is an important key point for the business as it allows the organization to understand what the customer gets from the service or product against which they pay (Vecchiato 2017). Customer assess value before and after buying the product thus identifying the type of customer value is prior for the organization while delivering the customer value.

Identification and critically evaluate the various disruptive strategic innovations by the main competitors of Sainsbury’s

Tesco, Asda, Morrison, and Aldi are key competitors of the Sainsbury’s in the supermarket segment of UK. In the recent years, Sainsbury is now under the threat of the disruptive strategic innovations that are used by its competitors.

Disruptive strategic innovation by ASDA

Asda focuses on renewing the different pick up points for the customers. In the year 2014 Asda introduced in state of the art click and collect technical process. This new technology provides the opportunity to the consumers of Asda to collect their products from the standalone, intelligent pods which are under the controlled temperature. Customers can get their product within sixty seconds through such disruptive innovative process (asda.com 2017).  

Asda has placed their digital approach features on the Instagram, which is a significant disruptive strategic innovation. Thorough which customers are able to see the Christmas special products of Asda as this approach included video of the new products of Asda.  As argued by Flavin (2017), significant disruptive strategy by the competitors of an organization is a big threat for such organization. Hence, in the case of Sainsbury’s the above disruptive strategic innovations of Asda especially the digital approach and the click and collect strategy will be a concerned matter for such organization. Such strategic innovation may affect the position of Sainsbury in the UK super market. As suggested by Blackley et al. (2017), application of the disruptive strategies by the other organizations often helps their competitors to enhance their business strength. Hence, Sainsbury will be able to their business planning by observing the strategies of Asda as they can get a primary idea regarding the action of their competitor.

Disruptive Strategic Innovation by Asda

Tesco’s disruptive strategic innovation

Tesco is one of the leading retailers in the UK and involves in developing different disruptive strategic innovation to enhance the delivery of customer value. Tesco Home Plus is a new brand, through which the customers are able for virtual shopping by using their mobile phone in the subway stations or from other places. This is the great innovation of Tesco to gain competitive advantages in the global market.  This is a significant innovative disruptive approach of Tesco offers virtual shopping through the QR codes from underground stations or other places. However, consumers have no need to go to the shop to buy their products and they can order their product through their smart phone, which also saves their time. This strategy is a radical innovation of Tesco regarding the journey of the conventional shopping (tesco.com 2017).

Tesco Home Plus Application allows the customers to scan the QR of the virtual products during their transportation through the mobile phone. Consumers get a perfect replica of the each product through the QR code. As mentioned by Peppard, Joe and John Ward (2016), mobile marketing is useful for any business organization to enhance their market share in the UK supermarket. In the recent years, it is a time to apply and utilize the benefits of the advanced technology in the business. The new strategic innovation of Tesco enables the traveling consumers to buy their daily shopping through QR scanning and they can check out and pay by their credit card easily. This is a time saving and quick process of online marketing applied by Tesco. As argued by Nagy, Schuessler and Dubinsky (2016), often popular organizations are affected if they fail to adopt new technologies. Hence, application disruptive strategy by Tesco through the mobile phone brings a technological threat for other organizations as for example for Sainsbury’s.

Disruptive strategic innovation by Aldi and Morrison

Aldi is one of the strongest competitors of Sainsbury’s, which focuses on developing innovative characters in their existing product rather than representing the branded products. Such organization also involves in launching quality products at low price and to reduce investment on the product display (aldi.co.uk 2017). Such organization provided their effort to bring improvement in dairy products, meat, and canned products as these are the daily needs of the consumers. As argued by Obayi et al. (2017), often the organizations invest more in the display rather than improvement in product quality, which is vital. Aldi tries to understand the market psychology by judging their customers and give value to their perspectives as it is an essential part of delivering customer value.

Tesco’s Disruptive Strategic Innovation

Morrison’s focuses on the digital transformation, improvement in the organizational structure and the relationship with the external agencies. Temperature control and virtual store are the useful examples of digital approaches of Morrison (groceries.morrisons.com 2017). Hence, the above disruptive strategic innovations are useful for Asda, Tesco, Aldi and Morrison’s to gain competitive advantages and to improve their delivery of customer’s values.

Recommendation and the Justification of the suitable response generated by the Tesco in context of Sainsbury’s

  Sainsbury needs to establish the proper disruptive strategy that is useful to protect the organization from the displacement. As suggested by Cohen and Ilieva (2015), in the recent year virtual shopping is a useful process for the consumers and they are benefited from this. However, Tesco focuses on the disruptive innovation model, which highlights the technological progress. Hence, by using disruptive innovation strategy the competitors can sustain their growth. In the context of Sainsbury implementation of the virtual shopping with the smart phone will be a good disruptive strategic innovation in their business.

Application of Tesco Home Plus as the mobile app Tesco maximizes their online marketing in the global market. As commented by Recker (2015), many passengers have to wait in the railway station and the bus stoppage during their daily journey thus virtual shopping through the mobile phone is an easiest and accessible way for them. Keeping this mind Tesco invent such strategy they enable them to achieve competitive advantages in the UK as well as in the global market. Virtual shopping, temperature controlled, Quevision and face pay are the common digital approaches of online marketing that are used by the key competitors of Sainsbury.

Among such digital marketing strategies virtual shopping through smart phone would be significant for Sainsbury’s. Virtual shopping via mobile is an innovative strategy as it is much convenient for the customers. As asserted by Parnell et al.  (2017), purchasing cost can be reduced through the mobile shopping. However, consumers are able to save their transportation cost of their daily shopping as it is a cost effective process. Hence, implementation of such strategy will help Sainsbury’s to cover a large number of customers from different geographical regions of UK. Therefore, Sainsbury’s has no required providing training to their staff and incorporation of such strategy requires lower cost during its launching.  Sainsbury will able to acquire the incumbent floor space for their retail organization in comparison to establish a new physical store.

Disruptive Strategic Innovation by Aldi and Morrison

According to Obayi et al. (2017), virtual shopping through online is more acceptable to the customers in comparison to the conventional shopping. People have to face a painful process while checking the product catalog over PC Hence, virtual shopping through the mobile allows consumers to scan the QR code of the product and they can easily get product information (Blackley et al. 2017). Tesco has obtained a significant expansion in their business without purchasing any real estate. They have got a significant positive impact on their cash flow. Such positive impact of using the mobile application of virtual shopping on Tesco ensures the effectiveness of such disruptive strategic innovation hence, for the Sainsbury’s virtual shopping by incorporating new apps in the smart phone will be a good disruptive strategic approach for fast selling and increasing the number of customers.

Conclusion

 The entire piece of work reveals the different disruptive strategies used by various competitors of Sainsbury’s. However, Tesco, Asda, Morrisons, and Aldi are the key competitors of Sainsbury’s. Aldi focuses on the click and collects approach while Tesco focuses on the mobile marketing. Aldi provides their concern to the product features rather than price. On the other hand, Morrison focuses on the technological transformation to establish their disruptive strategy. Hence, for the Sainsbury’s implementation of mobile marketing will be an effective way to get competitive advantages in the market. This disruptive approach is cost effective, time effective and more acceptable to the consumers in comparison to conventional shopping.

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