Retailer Price Analysis: Toys

As usual we’ve had a look at what has happened to prices during the sale period.  Using our retail pricing intelligence to look at which retailers drop prices on products they were selling in the run up to Christmas.  This gives us a good insight in to which sales are genuinely across current ranges and which are likely to contain older ‘sale’ stock.

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Cogenta Pricing Intelligence: Toys CategoryWe’ve updated the retail intelligence report for the toy category.  We had feedback from a few people who said they’d prefer a more definite price positioning indicator so we’ve added one.  This report shows an index that has been created by looking at each retailer’s price position against the market.  The analysis compares the products available at each retailer against the other retailers offering the same product.  This creates a more robust piece of retail intelligence and shows a clear competitive position acoss the market.

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Why do certain parts of the media take such a negative view of retailers? The latest online article by one of the daily papers suggests that online price variations are used to rip consumers off.  I really don’t understand how retailers driving prices down is bad for consumers. There may be times when some retailers attract people with misleading pricing but with the exception of these cases the consumer gets a great deal from online price matching.

It’s tough for retailers to build the right processes that ensure their price position is competitive whilst also enabling them to make money. If they don’t adapt they don’t survive with the consequence being a loss of choice for consumers, more empty shops and people losing their jobs. Comet being a perfect example but there have been a number over the last few years.

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Mary Meeker presented the KPCB end of year update this week.  As always there is some fascinating information on internet usage as well as some great insight to the way the internet continues to change our lives.  With every presentation the impact of mobile internet usage is more prominent highlighted by India being the first geography where mobile internet has over taken desktop usage, with more countries to follow soon.

I’ve listed below some of the more mobile related insights but it is worth taking the time to flick through the slidedeck when you have more than a few minutes!

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We’re starting to publish a new range of reports which compare the price performance of UK retailers in different categories.  Here is the first report showing the relative price of retailers in the toys category as of 30 November 2012.  The analysis is based on all the products collected and matched through the Cogenta platform which covers the UK’s top 150 retailers.  Products were only included in the analysis where there were three or more retailers selling that product.

See an explanation of the columns after the table. (more…)