Morrison's launches new pricing campaign

Morrisons has begun to roll out a new grocery pricing and marketing campaign called Price Crunch as part of the long-term realignment as a "value" supermarket.

The FTSE 100 grocer announced that it will cut the price of 1,072 items, mostly on fresh food, with an average 19% reduction and deep discounts on fruit and vegetables.

“We continue to listen carefully to customers and they have told us they want lower prices, particularly on fresh food and everyday essentials," chief executive David Potts said.

"As we improve our customers’ shopping trip we are becoming more competitive with our own distinct set of prices.”

The ‘Price Crunch’ marketing campaign will include external and in-store advertising, with the rolling programme of lower prices typically lasting a minimum of three months.

As Morrisons, uniquely among the big supermarkets, is vertically integrated and makes more than half of the fresh food it sells, it plans to keep prices down through its internal food manufacturing business.

House broker Shore Capital said the move was "another notch in its progress to being a more distinctive value orientated superstore" and that, as Potts has been emphasising, the company is on a "long journey" and so patience is necessary.

Shares in Morrison's initially spiked up to a three-month high of 177.6p before dropping off to 174.4p towards noon, almost flat on the day.