Sir Stelios Haji-Ioannou, the maverick founder of easyJet, is preparing to do battle with low cost supermarkets such as Aldi and Lidl by launching his own budget food chain by the end of the year.
The entrepreneur is understood to be close to securing his first site to pilot “easyFoodstore”, which will take on the budget supermarket chains as well as other shops such as Poundland that sell food at bargain prices.
Stelios’s easyGroup has set up a website for easyFoodstore.com, which promises that the venture is “coming soon”. EasyGroup has also applied to turn the easyFoodstore name into a trademark.
Britain’s £160bn a year grocery market is fiercely competitive but research shows that the budget chains Lidl and Aldi have succeeded in gaining market share at the expense of Tesco, Sainsbury’s, Asda and Morrisons over the past few years, attracting shoppers on tight budgets.
Researchers at Kantar Worldpanel say there has been a long-term “polarisation” of the UK grocery market, with both the budget chains and upmarket stores such as Waitrose eating away at the big four supermarkets’ sales. Lidl’s share of the market is 3.1pc while Aldi occupies 3.6pc.
A spokesman for easyGroup declined to comment.
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