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The objective of this research is to develop a framework for competitive strategies in food retailing. Managers of food retail channels were surveyed in order to derive the basic dimensions of competitive advantages that companies attempt to achieve in this industry sector. In a second study based on consumers, the central dimensions of retail store perception were investigated. Both studies reveal that three basic types of competitive advantage seem to prevail in food retailing: (1) price, (2) quality (with a comprehensive set of quality-orientated instruments, including customer service), (3) convenience. We find quality leadership and price leadership to be independent factors which can be achieved without conflicting with one another.

Competitive strategies deal with the development of attributes that characterise a company and differentiate the value it creates and offers in comparison to its competitors (Porter, 1980), i.e. the “core idea about how the firm can best compete in the market place” (Pearce and Robinson, 1994, p. 220). Because competition in the retail sector has been increasing for years, the importance of developing an effective competitive strategy appears to be increasing constantly (Cortjens and Doyle, 1989; Ellis and Kelley, 1992; Harris and Ogbonna, 2001). Given that retailing has become a mature industry with overcapacity, high concentration and, in many cases, price-driven marketing strategies which have led to rather homogeneous stores, differentiation from competitors through positioning seems increasingly necessary (Wortzel, 1987; Walters and Knee, 1989, p. 74). According to Porter (1985), competitive strategy can be understood as the activities a company undertakes to gain a sustainable competitive advantage in a particular industry. These activities are determined by the strategic decision on the particular competitive advantage which the company is attempting to achieve, i.e. what advantage should be used to elevate the company from its competitors? This competitive advantage should fulfil certain criteria (Simon, 1988; Aaker, 1992; Mintzberg, 1996, p. 88; Walters and Knee, 1989; Brooksbank, 1994, p. 12; Corstjens and Doyle, 1989, p. 171). It must: • Relate to an attribute with value and relevance to the targeted customer segment. • Be perceived by the customer. • Be sustainable, i.e. not easily imitated by competitors. Consequently, the competitive advantage that a company selects should be based on its resources, strengths or distinctive competencies relative to competitors (Brooksbank, 1994, p. 12), but must also be perceived by consumers. That is, consumers must be aware of these competencies. This implies a simultaneous consumer and competitor-orientated perspective in the development of competitive strategies (Aaker, 1992). In his familiar matrix with the dimensions “competitive advantage” and “scope of operation”, Porter (1985) assumes that there are essentially three generic types of competitive strategy (based on two basic types of competitive advantage): cost leadership, differentiation and focus on certain target segments (which itself is either anchored through low-cost or differentiation). He also emphasises that companies must “make a choice” between the different generic strategies, since “being ‘all things to all people’ is a recipe for strategic mediocrity and below-average performance” (Porter, 1985, p. 12; see also Mintzberg, 1996, p. 87). While it is commonly accepted that the (basic) concept of competitive advantage and competitive strategy is applicable across different industries, researchers have criticised Porter's concept in several respects, including the allegedly oversimplified dichotomy of cost leadership vs. differentiation (for an overview, see Miller and Dees, 1993). Also, the particular characteristics of certain industries, including (food) retailing, would require a more specific concept and allow different competitive advantages than in other industries (e.g. Harris and Ogbonna, 2001, p. 157; Uncles, 1998; Turock, 1999). While Porter's concept has been tested for manufacturing companies in a number of studies, empirical evidence on the generalisability of the concept to retailing is rare. Accordingly, the purpose of this research is to investigate empirically Porter's framework of competitive advantage in the context of food retailing. Two empirical studies are conducted in order to develop a framework for competitive strategy and to evaluate the transferability of Porter's two basic types of strategy to retailing, one focussing on retail companies and the advantages they attempt to offer their customers compared to their competitors, and the other study surveying consumers and the dimensions in which they perceive food retail stores. Both aspects (company and consumer view) are treated as two perspectives of the same phenomenon in this paper.

One central research issue was to identify distinguishable competitive strategies in food retailing. There is a paucity of detailed and large-scale empirical research and the results obtained in earlier research are, in any event, ambiguous. One objective of this investigation was to derive basic types of competitive strategy for a specific retail sector and to do this from two perspectives. Firstly, whether there are basic dimensions of competitive advantage was tested from a retail company perspective. Reducing a large item battery of potential advantages by means of factor analysis, three factors were extracted and discussed in detail. It was shown that three dimensions of competitive advantages can be derived and that Porter's dichotomy of quality and cost leadership is not confirmed by the empirical data in the company survey. Quality and cost/price leadership do not contradict each other, but are independent dimensions of competitive advantage. In addition, a third dimension, convenience, was shown to be a potential basic competitive advantage for food retailers. From the consumer perspective, different food retail store perception items were aggregated by factor analysis. Again, the analysis resulted in three factors, which did not support Porter's hypothesis of only one dimension of strategic strength. As in the company perspective, from the consumer perspective, price advantages and quality advantages are not diametrically opposed, but separate factors (only slightly negatively correlated). Convenience is also a central dimension of retail store perceptions of consumers. Table 7 compares the results of both empirical studies. Considering the basic types of competitive strategies and the central dimensions of consumer perception of retail stores, the results are very similar and in the core findings, even parallel. In each perspective, three dimensions were extracted, (1) a price-orientated dimension, (2) a quality-orientated dimension, and (3) a convenience-orientated dimension. None of the conceptual papers on competitive strategies in retailing (e.g. Walters and Knee, 1989; Wortzel, 1987) have proposed these exact dimensions, but the finding resembles the results of an early store image analysis. Doyle and Fenwick (1974/75) used multidimensional scaling to extract quality, selection and price as central dimensions of grocery store perception. The strong focus on convenience in our survey (which is related to selection) probably only developed later.