As shown above, it recently announced the closing of Tesco Direct, the company's profitless e-commerce initiative for non-food products. (Tesco.com is the company's grocery website.) Fulfilment is costly, maintaining an online shopping platform is costly and the company saw no way to profit from this venture. Most likely, competition was also a factor, with Amazon and others offering so many of the same brand-name products that were sold on Tesco Direct's site.
Yet Tesco continues to invest in physical stores. It opened a new supermarket in Dublin that features eco-friendly features such as energy conservation systems and recycling facilities.
The Tesco Clubcard is a major competitive strength, enabling the retailer to communicate with loyal customers and personalise offers. And Tesco will need this strength as it faces the soon-to-merge Sainsbury/Asda combination.
