You only have to go into your nearest supermarket to find that promotional activity is now in full swing as retailers seek desperately to grab as many sales as possible (regardless of margin it seems) over Christmas.

I suspect there won’t be a consumer in the land who ends up paying top dollar for their alcohol this Christmas. It is more difficult to find a beer on full-price than it is one on a whacking great promotion. When the BOGOF first hit the market it did wonders for sales of products that needed a bit of a push but today such mechanisms are ubiquitous. Many shoppers are now unwilling to pay full-price for products such is their addiction to promotions. Their choice of product is determined only by what is on promotion – their only loyalty is to these promotions and not to any specific brands.

With tough times ahead and promotions so rampant maybe this Christmas could be the high water mark for such activity. There is no doubt that all the major grocers would call time on their most aggressive promotions if they could guarantee all their rivals would do the same. Clearly there is a massive risk in choosing to go down this route but at some stage there has to be a let-up of sorts because with raw material costs and energy prices increasing like never before suppliers simply might not be (willing or) able to give away margin to the extent that they have in the past to support the BOGOF and its offspring.