Lidl is planning to invest GBP 1.5m on the UK market over the next three years. The German discount retailer intends to open between 40 and 50 stores per year that will include self-checkouts and customer toilets. Lidl is also set to refurbish around 150 of its existing locations to fit its “store of the future” model. The company recently opened its first “store of the future” in Rushden, Northamptonshire. The GBP 2m store spreads over 1,400 sqm and offers customer toilets, baby changing facilities and self-checkouts. Future stores will be equipped with wider aisles and energy-efficient LED lighting. The retailer also plans to use recycled heat from its refrigerators to warm its stores.
“Lidl is definitely chasing a more upmarket clientele as well as its traditional shopper base,” Bryan Roberts of the market research company Kantar told the UK Guardian. “The worry is that it is adding costs and complexity into a model where the heritage has always been being brutally efficient with a very narrow (range of products). Arguably, the distinction between a supermarket and a discounter is ebbing away.”
