Which South African retailer is managing loadshedding the best?

[CraigThePlague]

I created this for my LinkedIn and thought some of you might find it interesting aswell

I was curious about this question so decided to compare Pick ‘n Pay, Woolworths and Shoprite Holdings (including Checkers) based on how much diesel they used per year due to loadshedding (Woolworths figure includes stock spoilage). Figures for Pick ‘n Pay and Shoprite are both net after electricity savings due to running the generators. This comparison aims to highlight which retailer has successfully managed to implement solar power, energy saving measures or negotiate with landlords in order to save costs on diesel.

Total diesel costs were converted using the sum of the time weighted loadshedding stage during the respective financial years (i.e. 6 hours of stage 1 = 1 hour of stage 6 = 2 hours of stage 3). Pick ‘n Pay faced 917, Woolworths 1045, Shoprite 1065. All costs were converted to an equivalent of the loadshedding Shoprite Holdings faced.

Now to the numbers:

	Revenue per R of diesel	Diesel cost per store per year	Diesel cost per m2 of store space per year
Pick ‘n Pay	R206​	R369 771​	R242​
Woolworths	R192​	R409 061​	R430​
Shoprite Holdings	R177​	R423 076​	R263​

From the number above we can see that Pick ‘n Pay is the clear winner with the most revenue per R1 spent on diesel and the lowest diesel costs per store and per m2. I am unsure for the reasons for this difference, it could come from various factors including things both in and outside of managements control.

Ultimately this is not a perfect comparison as the different retailers operate with varied portfolios of stores that respond differently to the effects of loadshedding. It is also impossible to quantify the economic impact of loadshedding as well as the changing consumer behavior due to it.



More details and calculations:

Methodology and Data

 

[P1000]

Interesting that they are all so close in terms of the first column.
Another deduction is that Woolworths generates a lot more revenue per m² than the others.

 

[CraigThePlague]

Interesting that they are all so close in terms of the first column.
Another deduction is that Woolworths generates a lot more revenue per m² than the others.

If I had to guess why the m2 is so much higher for Woolworths may be due to their smaller food stores. Speaking anecdotally the proportion of space of a Woolworths store that is fridge/ freezer is much higher than a Pick n Pay or Checkers thus higher cost per m2

 

[🇹🇭🇪 🇩🇴🇳]

If I had to guess why the m2 is so much higher for Woolworths may be due to their smaller food stores. Speaking anecdotally the proportion of space of a Woolworths store that is fridge/ freezer is much higher than a Pick n Pay or Checkers thus higher cost per m2

True

 

[masee]

Are they not moving to solar big time to reduce their diesel costs ?