Amazon to enter UK grocery market: Reports
11 Aug 2015
Online shopping giant Amazon is said to be gearing up for entering the UK grocery market, pitting it against major players such as Tesco and Sainsbury's.
According to Retail Week, the Seattle-based firm, which counts over 7,000 staff in the UK, had signed a 10-year lease on a former 300,000-plus sq ft Tesco warehouse in Surrey.
This has renewed speculation that the firm, which is engaged in a range of activities from the sale of books to making TV programmes, would launch its Amazon Fresh food operation in the UK.
Amazon Fresh, which launched in the US in 2007, could challenge the rest of the UK grocery market, which is engaged in a fierce price war that had seen prices fall by around 1.6 per cent over the last year.
Retail Week reported that Amazon had also secured on rent two more warehouses in Leicestershire and Staffordshire, which too were suitable for handling fresh produce.