by Paul Stanway

Created on: September 29, 2008   Last Updated: August 23, 2011

There are a broad variety of shops available to do your grocery shopping online in the UK and arrange a home delivery of those items.

This is both a convenient and a relatively cheap way of making sure that your fresh produce is delivered, although there are many different services for grocery shopping online, both in terms of scale, price and property.

This article will look at the main types of grocery outlets, and look at the advantages and disadvantages of grocery shopping online.

1. SUPERMARKETS

Many supermarkets in the UK such as Tesco, Sainsburys, ASDA, Marks & Spencers and Waitrose have been extremely effective in bringing to customers the many benefits of grocery shopping online.

Here are some advantages of doing your grocery shopping online in this fashion.

Firstly, you can do your grocery shopping as well as your other shopping in one fell swoop. This helps to save on postage and keeps things simple.

Secondly, of all the various outlets available for shopping online, the supermarkets tend to be the cheapest.

As well as advantages, however, there are also a number of disadvantages that have to be considered when doing grocery shopping online although large retailers.

Firstly, although the big supermarkets often try to convince you otherwise, the quality of their groceries are regularly not nearly as good as the more specialist retailers.

Secondly, while it may appear cheaper to go through the supermarkets, often their pricing contains a large number of hidden costs; while potatoes and other staple foods may be very cheap, often supermarkets make their profits on more specialist products.

Thirdly, supermarkets are not particularly well known for their treatment of the environment. Although environmental concerns are continually under scrutiny, the profit motive of supermarkets often detracts from their concern over the environment in general.

Overall, if you are looking for a convenient and reliable purveyor of grocery shopping online, but aren't too bothered about the quality of the produce you may be getting, supermarkets offer a highly competitive solution for grocery shopping online.

A comparison of the major supermarkets reveals a number of differences between them in terms of quality, price and availability of service. While Waitrose, Sainsbury's and Marks & Spencers are fairly patchy in their coverage, and do not offer the greatest value for money, Tesco and Sainburys are highly recommended by many advocates of this form of grocery shopping

• 1
• 2
• Next Page >>