Retailers have taken action to ensure as little disruption as possible to business after snow and poor weather hit many parts of the country over the weekend.
Snow started falling on Friday and continued all weekend. On Sunday up to four centimetres fell in the West and North, and six centimetres in the East Midlands, East Anglia and the South East, including London.
Snow is expected to fall until Thursday.
A Waitrose spokesman told Retail Week that the the grocer battled to deliver products to stores from Friday.
He said: “Our distribution centres and suppliers worked very hard to ensure that deliveries got through to branches on Friday and over the weekend.
“We have also placed additional orders with suppliers to ensure our shops are fully stocked with everyday staples during the cold spell.”
He also said that Waitrose customers were well prepared and had stocked up in advance of the cold snap, and had focused on buying “everyday staples as well as winter warming products like soups, pies and hot chocolate”.
The snow has proved to be a winner for some retailers. High street footwear retailer Shoe Zone said it had sold 51,000 pairs of wellies since January 14 - a rate of almost 15 pairs per minute.
Marketing and property director Naomi Shefford said like-for-like sales for wellies are up 673% compared with the same week last year.
Grocers incuding Sainsbury’s and Tesco also made extra efforts to ensure online orders were delivered to customers - one Sainsbury’s staffer even used a sledge to beat the wintry conditions (see video).
Tesco reported that sales of traditional British winter comfort food such as stews, soup and puddings are in high demand. The grocer has also experienced “significant demand” for shovels, with sales soaring 200% in the week to January 20.
An Ocado spokeswoman said: “Over the last few days we’ve seen a significant amount of snowfall across the UK and despite our very best efforts, challenging road conditions have forced us to cancel a small amount of orders in some affected areas. We pride ourselves on doing everything possible to keep on delivering and customers can rest assured that we have made every imaginable effort to get to them. Ocado has the only delivery fleet in the UK with winter tyres and our vans are able to cope with extreme weather, however as in previous years, many roads haven’t been treated and are impassable, particularly in rural areas.
“Our service will return to normal very soon and every customer impacted by the cancellations will be contacted by Ocado and given the opportunity to rebook their delivery slot.”
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