In one of Alan Bennett's Talking Heads dramas, someone exposes themselves in a branch of Sainsbury's. "Tesco's you could understand," says an elderly woman tartly. It's a remark that neatly sums up both the British obsession with class and our almost tribal attachment to specific supermarket brands. Tesco, the implication goes, is for commoner people who are slightly more likely to drop their trousers in public than Sainsbury's shoppers. By extension, Waitrose is for those more likely to have second homes in Chiantishire than the first two; Asda for people who aspire to have a second home anywhere but probably never will; Lidl for people who have never heard of Chiantishire; Marks and Spencer for those who affect to have never heard of Lidl. That kind of thing.
This may sound like a small matter. But it goes to the heart of a £75bn industry that has radically changed our landscapes, our lifestyles and our bank balances. The supermarket industry's enormous value explains the ferocity with which the recent £3bn takeover battle for the Safeway chain was fought between Asda-Walmart and eventual victors Morrison. And it's one in which targeting the right demographic through cunningly devised images is massively important: for instance, Prunella Scales has reportedly earned Tesco £2.2bn since 1998 for her TV ad performances as a penny-pinching silver spender, while mockney superchef Jamie Oliver is estimated to have swollen Sainsbury's takings by £1.12bn in the past 18 months.
The lucrative struggle for Britain's shoppers is set to intensify in the next few weeks, as Morrison's strives to boost the profitability of its Safeway chain by cutting prices of 800 goods, and rivals inevitably follow suit. In this looming price war, the winners are likely to be those who know their customers best, and their most potent weapons will be endless gigabytes of information drawn from sophisticated - and themselves vastly valuable - geodemographic analyses of British customers.
The food writer Jonathan Meades makes the point that, much more than elsewhere, social class determines what one eats in Britain. In France it is different: "If you take a labourer in Marseilles and a CEO in Marseilles, they will eat approximately the same food," says Meades. "In this country there is no link between what a guy who is working in a building site in Southampton eats and the guy who runs that site - they eat completely different things."
Given that most Britons buy most of their food from supermarkets, it's a small step from Meades' point to the conclusion that our supermarkets are class-stratified. Verdict Research, for instance, has found that Waitrose has the highest proportion of shoppers from the professional social classes A and B (47%), followed by Sainsbury's (34%), Marks & Spencer (22%), Tesco (21%) and Safeway (17%). At the bottom of the market, 72% of Netto's shoppers are blue-collar Ds or Es, with Kwik Save (66%), Lidl (54%) and Somerfield (50%) close behind.
Of course, such figures don't tell the whole story. Different social classes shop at different branches of the same chain. My local Sainsbury's in London, for instance, is in a district noted for its drive-by shootings and has a clientele to match; the branch in Finchley Road, about four miles away, has £74.99 bottles of Krug on open display and is is patronised almost exclusively by Messrs Ladi and Dah. And it suits the supermarkets, clearly, to strive to lure both ends of the spectrum. That's why Tesco has both its "Finest" ranges and its "Value" products - so it can be all things to all people. Peter Jackson, professor of human geography at Sheffield University, who has been conducting a three-year study into supermarket loyalty and social class, says: "What's clear from our research is that people just don't see those ranges that 'aren't for them'. In Sainsbury's, for example, some people will walk past the 'Taste the Difference' ranges to the budget ranges. They won't even see the ones that aren't targeted at them. And vice versa."
It is not all about class. Subjective matters such as the pleasantness of the store, or how its decor, music and baking fragrances chime with one's own self-image (all of which Jackson brackets under "cultural capital") can be just as important as objective factors like price and convenience. But there is little question that all this multi-sensory ingenuity is deployed to keep people from the targeted social classes coming through the doors. This may mean that one favours a particular branch of Sainsbury's over another, but it will also mean that there are some supermarket chains one will never visit. "The problem for the supermarkets," says Jackson, "is to provide a store environment that is attractive to a wide range of people to maximise their market share, while shoppers seem to want a more differentiated environment where they will be surrounded by people 'like themselves', with whom they feel comfortable."
Data analysts Experian contend that the old class system isn't flexible enough to be of use to supermarkets when deciding such matters as where to put their stores, what kind of music to have on the PA, or whether to move the beer next to the nappies after 6pm (as some stores do) so after-work booze-hound fathers will remember there's something in their lives other than themselves. The old A-E classes are tied to occupation, which is insufficient data for a supermarket which is trying to lure cash-rich plumbers to buy their poncy coffees, rather than molecular biologists (say) who can only afford gruel and coarse toilet paper.
To deal with this, Experian has devised a consumer classification system called Mosaic UK, which many supermarkets use to help make key decisions (where to put a store, what to fill it with, etc). Using the 2001 Census figures and data on such things as county court judgments, credit ratings, qualifications, car ownership, age and background, and working on this data with geodemographic software, Mosaic UK divides the country into 11 groups, each of which is given an evocative name and a stereotypical - and determinedly heterosexual - couple to match. These 11 master categories break down into 61 delightfully named sub-groups (Golden Empty Nesters, Dinky Developments, White Van Culture, Town Gown Transition etc).
So where do you shop? It says a great deal more about you than you may care to acknowledge.
Waitrose
Rupert and Felicity, of the "symbols of success" group, which represents 9.6% of UK households, are most likely to shop here. According to Experian: "The air of discretion and understatement that is associated with traditional premium brands appeals more than the flamboyance and conspicuous consumption associated with the nouveau riche."
At the branch in Finchley Road, north-west London, there is no piped music, one brand of truffle oil and a well-groomed clientele politely manoeuvring around such features as the well-appointed salad bar, reassuringly in the same place as when I first visited this store 15 years ago. The cream-and-green livery, and the dearth of loud-mouthed, ill-groomed yahoos in significant number, are soothing.
A £53,000-a-year sales manager is taking a large mixed salad and a bottle of still mineral water back to his new Peugeot estate car. "It's more expensive than nearby supermarkets, but it speaks to me. It's the kind of shop that I feel comfortable in. It's quiet, classy, unpretentious. Of course, if I was unemployed or on a lower income I'd feel otherwise and shop elsewhere."
A retired psychotherapist with a brisk manner, an M-reg Volvo estate and a basket of fresh vegetables, adds: "There's no big sales pitch here, which is very refreshing. You don't feel as though your intelligence is being insulted. I like the fact that the goods are sourced ethically. You don't feel as though you're taking part in the globalised nightmare."
Prices
2 pints semi-skimmed milk 58p
450g chicken tikka masala and rice £2.35
1.5kg plain flour 48p
4-pack loo roll £1.59
Sainsbury's
Our friends Rupert and Felicity are quite likely to shop here, too, but the most likely Sainsbury's shoppers are Ben and Chloe, the "urban intelligence" archetypes, who represent 7.2% of UK households. Young, well-educated, cosmopolitan in their tastes, liberal in their outlooks and unlikely to have children, many Bens and Chloes live in inner-city areas and have high levels of disposable income.
At the exclusive Finchley Road branch, there are three kinds of traditional Japanese sea vegetable, no piped music, not just truffle oil but white truffle oil, and more kinds of olive oil than seems proper. This was the branch that Jamie Oliver's wife Jules walked past in favour of the above-mentioned Waitrose store, even though her husband was being paid £250,000 a year to promote Sainsbury's. And one can see why she did: this Sainsbury's is a store of riches, where fine wines are juxtaposed against a vast range of novelty socks too vulgar to find a place in Waitrose, and baking fragrances titillate the nostrils.
A carefully groomed woman in her mid-40s and swathed in mauve, who declines to specify her income or profession, is loading her shopping into a BMW estate with the help of someone who may have been her mother, or, quite possibly, servant. She says: "If I'm being honest, Sainsbury's makes me feel good about myself. I'm rich and I'm living life well. Shopping here is part of all that."
Doesn't the evident fact that Sainsbury's public face, Jamie Oliver, is a mockney herbert put you off shopping here, I ask a twentysomething nursery school teacher on £19,000 a year? "Not at all. He lives a good life. He's cool. So am I. He's a bit more funky than Prunella Scales [who plays the penny-pinching mother in the Tesco's ad]." Can you afford to shop here? "Yes, but it's very tempting to buy the expensive goods here and go mad. That's why I come on a mountain bike to restrict myself: I can't carry that much home."
Prices
2 pints semi-skimmed milk 58p
Chicken tikka masala with rice (500g) £3.29
1.5 kg plain flour 79p
4-pack loo roll £1.55 from Superfine range (or 9 rolls for £1 from the low-price range).
Tesco
The second most important shoppers to Tesco, after Rupert and Felicity, are Darren and Joanne, the "happy families" group, who represent 10.8% of UK households. Young couples raising young children, they work in large public or private organisations and live in areas of rapidly expanding employment, such as Northampton, Milton Keynes and Swindon.
"You get all kinds of income levels shopping here," says Nick Gladding, Verdict Research's senior analyst of economics and forecasting, "but Tesco is determinedly moving away from being downmarket and price-led. It's Britain's most successful grocer at the moment, and it's trying to move into Sainsbury's AB demographic." This may well explain the new "grab-and-go olive counter" at the Colney Hatch branch in north London.
Tesco, however, still has a value-fixated slogan ("Every little helps"), while Sainsbury's, interestingly, is the only British supermarket that has a quality-related one ("Making life taste better"). The former, no doubt, appeals to the more anxious and income-straitened, hence Scales' price-obsessed TV persona.
A thirtysomething housewife with a jar of pickled onions in either hand and baby girl in her trolley, says: "I come here because I think Tesco is posher than Sainsbury's, or at least of the two I'm comparing, Tesco certainly is nicer. But it's also cheaper."
Is a person more likely to drop their trousers in Tesco or Sainsbury's, I ask a man splattered with paint and carrying a 1.5-litre bottle of pop to the checkout with a jaunty air? "Tesco. At Sainsbury's they'd have to get someone else to do it for them."
Prices
2 pints semi-skimmed milk 58p
Chicken tikka masala 450 grammes £2.35
1.5 kg own-brand flour 48p ("Value" range flour 28p)
4-pack loo roll £1.55 (Value range: 42p)
Safeway
Surprisingly, it is "rural isolationists" Huw and Gwenda who are the group most likely to shop at Safeway. Rural isolation types, who make up 5.4% of UK households, live deep in the countryside and are not much influenced by the influx of urban commuters.
Unsurprisingly, there are no Huws or Gwendas at the Camden Town branch I visit in north London. A thirtysomething building society employee in a suit, clutching a box of Belgian choco-mints, says fondly: "I come here because it's quieter than other supermarkets. I like having quiet space to muse on what I'm buying. Maybe it's quiet because it's not successful. Whatever - I like that vibe."
Why shop here rather than the big Sainsbury's nearby, I ask a housewife pushing her granddaughter in a stroller, whose husband manages a bookmaker's. "Because it's easier here. And also because it isn't so snobby. I don't feel at home in Sainsbury's."
"Safeway suffered difficulties recently because it's choosing to go for the more affluent shoppers, but it doesn't really have the propositions to back that up," says Nick Gladding. "Its exclusive ranges don't really convince."
This point is borne out at the Camden Town branch, where the salad bar is a rather abject affair, and a big sign advertising a creche turns out to be misleading. "It's the CD shop now," says a member of staff. The "foods of the world" section includes an Irish range featuring Erin's traditional Scotch broth in powdered form. Tina Turner's What's Love Got to Do With It is playing in the background.
Prices:
2 pints semi-skimmed milk 61p
Chicken tikka masala with rice (500g) £3.49
1.5kg flour 50p (Savers range 36p)
4-pack loo roll £1.79 (Savers range 39p)
Marks & Spencer
Rupert and Felicity, again, are most likely to patronise Marks & Spencer, lured there no doubt by the dearth of piped music, a soothing green and silver livery and a snooty aura. "Interestingly," says Gladding, "Marks' food shoppers are more upmarket than the clothes shoppers." Least likely to visit M&S are Wayne and Leanne (the "municipal dependency" archetypes), who live on large, low-rise estates far from the centre of the city, and represent 6.7% of UK households. The second most likely group to shop at M&S are Darren and Joanne, the happy family.
At the food branch in Golders Green, the customary range of frighteningly unhealthy desserts and unsatisfyingly crunchy ready-made pizzas are being snapped up by a well-groomed bunch. An orchid-buying and very pregnant book editor, on maternity leave from her £35,000 job and whose husband works in the City "and earns more than double what I do", says: "I know it's a cliche but my mother shopped here and so do I. It feels traditional and right. I don't get all the weekly shop from here, but I like to buy a few things. Treats mostly. I like the staff and, without wanting to sound snobby, the other shoppers are well dressed. There aren't a lot of people here who are ... " Common? "You said it. I couldn't possibly comment."
Another woman, loading shopping into her H-reg VW Golf, adds: "This is a place for luxuries, not the staples. But it makes you feel good to shop here. You feel richer than you probably are." She declines to tell me her job or salary.
Prices
2 pints semi-skimmed milk 63p
Chicken tikka masala without rice (350g) £3.89
No flour
4-pack loo roll £2.49
Asda
Asda is the flipside of Safeway in terms of social composition: the store is mostly divided up between Darren and Joanne and Wayne and Leanne. For these groups, balancing the budget is much more important than long-term financial planning.
"Asda's not really upmarket, but is for people who see themselves as financially prudent and who feel anxious about getting ripped off," says Gladding. That probably explains why so many things are so delightfully cheap at the Wembley Park branch I visit: Best of the Specials CD, £3.97; bin-bag sized Indian meal for one, £2.51. That said, the garish lime green and yellow livery, the vaulted warehouse-like ceiling and increasingly irksome hot-cross bun aroma help explain why Rupert and Felicity tend to keep away. The public face of Asda is Julie Walters, Mrs Overall from Acorn Antiques meets price-busting fairy godmother. Her cheerful vulgarity must be very "non-U" for those who favour posher supermarkets.
"You can be as snobby as you like about Asda," says a mother with her adult daughter as she loads the weekly shop into a battered old BMW, before heading to a Neasden nail bar "for a treat". "But I save money every time I come here." What does she do for a living? "None of your business," she says, before adding, "I'm very happy shopping here. I feel comfortable with the place."
"I work very hard and I don't want to fritter my money away on luxuries," says a psychiatric nurse buying an "oozing" pizza and a side salad. She declines to reveal how much she earns, but says: "Asda is really the right shop for my income bracket. They keep prices very low and that's very important to me."
Prices
2 pints semi-skimmed milk 58p
Chicken tikka masala without rice (350 g) £1.98
1.5kg flour 38p (Smart Price range 27p)
4-pack loo roll £1.33 (Smart Price range 42p)
Morrisons
The "ties of community" group (aka Lee and Noreen), which represents 16% of the population, are most likely to shop here. Lee and Noreen's neighbourhoods are typically in former coalfield regions, old steel and shipbuilding towns and places with docks and chemical plants. Morrisons, too, is mostly based in the north of England.
"I really like shopping here," says a retired chip shop owner, shopping with her husband, a retired factory foreman, at the branch opposite Walthamstow dog track in east London. "It's very warm and welcoming. It used to be a Co-op and when it changed over it became much nicer. I like all the little subsections - the tobacconists, the meat counter, the deli. It's like a little world of traditional shops. I feel cosseted somehow." "We spend hours here," said her husband, "It's the best of the bunch for us, I suppose. It is cheap, you can't say it isn't, and that's what's most important." If that's the main factor, why don't they shop in Lidl or Kwik Save? "Oh no!" says his wife. "They're horrible! I wouldn't be caught dead in either of those. I'd feel I had to wash my hands afterwards."
Prices
2 pints semi-skimmed milk 58p
Chicken tikka masala with rice (450g) £1.99
1.5kg plain flour 45p (Bettabuys range 38p)
4-pack loo roll £1.05
Lidl
Wayne and Leanne shop here a fair bit, as they do at Kwik Save, Netto and Aldi. When the doors open at 9am at the Tottenham Hale branch, the waiting customers rush to a box filled with cheap watches. The floor is dirty, there is a smell of bleach and a disturbing sign: "Help us keep our prices low. If you're aware of anyone stealing Lidl goods don't turn a blind eye, call [number given] in absolute confidence." There is no piped music, and no truffle oil.
"I'm unemployed and I come here because it is the cheapest place to buy things that I know," says a man with his hands pushed deep into his pockets. "I come here by bus when I go to the job centre which is nearby."
An accountant rushing in to buy milk for her office says: "It's dirt cheap. There's no other reason for coming here. Even the milk is cheaper than anywhere else." Isn't it a bit dismal, with signs inviting you to grass people up? "I hadn't seen that sign. But no. That seems a good idea, especially with the sort of people who shop here."
Prices
Semi-skimmed milk only sold in 4-pint packs: 99p
Chicken tikka masala with rice (360g): 99p
1.5kg flour: 27p
4-pack loo roll: 99p
Ocado
Ocado is the home-delivery service attached to Waitrose, and thus has a strong claim to be the snootiest of such online services. Webber, though, is not so sure. "The people who are by far the most likely to order groceries on line are people who live in military bases." This is followed by a subgroup of the Bens and Chloes, called "new urban colonists", busy metropolitan families with big mortgages, living in older but fashionable streets of terraced houses.
"Oh, I use Ocado all the time," says a woman I meet in Waitrose. "When the van pulls up, I can see the net curtains twitching. I feel almost intolerably smug. The only way one could trump it is if Harvey Nicks had home-delivery vans. That would drive the neighbours wild."
I, too, patronise Ocado, and feel rather embarrassed by my conspicuous consumption when the delivery van double parks outside. When placing my order, I plump for the facility that enables me to book a van which is already making a delivery in my area at roughly the same time, thus sparing them another trip and salving my middle-class environmental conscience.
Because this is the first time I've used Ocado, they throw in a free copy of Good Housekeeping magazine. Good Housekeeping? I'm not a Good Housekeeping kind of guy! I'm a New Yorker kind of guy, a Monde Diplomatique kind of ponce. They might as well have chucked a free copy of OK! magazine and sicked up an economy bag of oven chips on to the doorstep. So much for your geodemographic software.
Prices
Same as Waitrose. Delivery costs £5 if you spend less than £75; otherwise it's free