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Abstract
Excerpt from the report: Many questions have been and continue to be raised about food discounting. Is it an innovation as significant as the introduction of the supermarket? Do discount food stores have economies of scale that conventional food stores do not? Is the variety and assortment of merchandise carried by discounters as complete as will be found in conventional food stores? Are discount house food departments operated at a loss in order to increase customer traffic? If so, are these losses subsidized by other departments of the discount houses? Are discount food prices lower than those in conventional food stores? Have the operators of conventional food stores made substantial changes in store operations to meet this new type of competition? What effect will food discounting have on food distribution? The purpose of this study was to seek the answers to these questions by comparing the operations of conventional and discount food retailers and evaluating the economic implications of the differences found to exist.