Food retailer Iceland has today announced that 450,000 Christmas delivery slots will start to be made available on its website from 13th December, guaranteeing delivery ahead of Christmas Day.
The announcement follows new research by the brand which reveals that 39% of Brits say they have been left out in the cold in previous years when it comes to a food delivery and one in three (32%) have been forced to pay a premium for slots during Christmas week.
With delivery slots at most supermarkets already taken, Iceland took a witty swipe at the competition with a ‘break glass in emergency’ rescue pack containing a prop turkey, being delivered to competitor stores, including Tesco, Asda and Morrisons.
The box was adorned with a cheeky message by Iceland for their rivals’ customers that read ‘break in case of emergency…or just book your delivery at Iceland.co.uk’
The move by Iceland to make 450,000 Christmas slots available follows recent news that Tesco shoppers who paid for early access to book festive delivery slots were left waiting for hours, only to find them booked up*.
The research also found that shoppers are fed up with Christmas slots being booked up far in advance of the big day, with a third (33%) having experienced considerable frustration at the Christmas booking process and the overwhelming majority (84%) believing this practice encourages a panic booking frenzy.
Meanwhile 43% of online food shoppers are worried they won’t get a delivery slot this year and a third (33%) have had to forgo a traditional Christmas dinner, because delivery slots were booked up.
Amongst those left without a Christmas delivery slot, 33% had to opt instead for a chicken and nearly 1 in 10 had no choice but to tuck into a pizza (9%) on December 25th.
The initiative by Iceland follows a major expansion of its delivery network last year, which resulted in an increase on peak delivery capacity by over 375%.
Jen Bartle, Head of Delivered Sales at Iceland said: “By laying on 130 additional vans we’ve managed to ensure that we will have 450,000 delivery slots to answer increased demand by customers for their all-important home food delivery this Christmas.
With our help, there should be no need for an emergency turkey dash this year. However, we do remind customers that although we can get the turkey to your front door, we can’t be held responsible for any accidental over-cooking”.
