Get In Line for Schoolwear Sunday

LONDON, August 30, 2011 -

• School uniform sales expected to up 35% at George at Asda this weekend
• Two items of school wear will be sold every second
• George at Asda’s ‘Click and Collect’ service already up 25% on this time last year
• School uniform market is worth over £959 million*

Sunday 28th August has been dubbed ‘Schoolwear Sunday’ by Asda as the UK’s largest school retailer** predicts it will be the busiest day in the year for sales of school uniforms and back to school essentials.

In a survey by Asda 1 in 5 parents reveal they plan to shop for their kid’s school uniform this weekend; 74% of parents admit they need to buy at least some of their children’s school uniform, 25% still need to purchase all of it***. Orders on George.com for school uniforms are already up 25% on this time last year, and figures are expected to rise by a further 15% this bank holiday weekend with more mums buying online and collecting in store, saving both time and money.  In addition sales in-store are expected to be up by a massive 20% compared to this time last year and the supermarket is prepared for an extra 590,000 shoppers to enter the 390 stores selling school must-haves.

The retail giant predicts two items of school wear will be sold every second, with the most popular item - a packet of two polo shirts, costing just £2.50 - expected to be sold every two seconds on Sunday.  And it’s not just uniforms; Asda is also expecting to sell almost a million pens, pencils, pencil cases and erasers. The school uniform market is currently worth over £959million and this is predicted to reach £1.14 billion by 2015 (Mintel Schoolwear Retail Intelligence), with supermarkets owning a 40% share.

Sarah Payne, school wear buyer for George at Asda said: “We have seen a huge surge in our buy online and collect in store service this week as it offers a quick and simple way for parents to buy their children’s uniforms. Some customers have told us they’re going to take advantage of the bank holiday weekend for their back to school shopping so we’re prepared for customer demand, and traditionally we see an increase in sales at this time of year.”

Asda also reveals price is the most important factor for mums and dads choosing their kid’s uniforms (43%), followed closely by quality (42%). Sarah Payne continues: “We know our customers want quality at affordable pricing and we are confident shoppers this weekend will find exactly what they need.  In fact we are so confident in our products that we still have our George 100day quality guarantee in place on all of our garments, and we have the seal of approval from the Good Housekeeping Institute.  We are the only retailer to offer such a generous returns policy, we’ve invested heavily on improving the quality and durability of our ranges.  Should you do need to bring something back simply return it within 100 days with proof of purchase and we’ll exchange it straight away or give you a full refund.”

Simon Jones, Money Expert, Moneysupermarket.com said: “More parents than ever are going online to find the best value items to help their children go back to school. Two services in particular can help ease this expensive and stressful time. Using a price comparison sites gives parents confidence they are getting the very best value for money whilst using the Click and Collect services offered by stores, like ASDA, eases pressure as parents know that the products they want, in the colours and sizes they need, will be available when they arrive to collect them.”

Notes to Editors

** Asda is the UK’s largest school retailer by volume

*** Pulse of the Nation survey carried out 19th - 22nd August 2011

About Asda Stores Ltd.

Founded in the 1960s, Asda today is one of Britain’s leading retailers.  It has over 170,000 dedicated Asda colleagues serving customers from 424 stores, including 25 ASDA Living stores, 23 depots and eight recycling centres across the UK (Great Britain and Northern Ireland). It has its main home office in Leeds, Yorkshire and its George clothing division based in Lutterworth Leicestershire. Asda serves over 18 million shoppers a week in store and its growing home shopping business serves over 97 per cent of UK homes.

About Chosen By You

Chosen By You is an unprecedented re-launch of Asda’s entire mid-tier own brand range, consisting of over 6,923 products. The launch follows an intense period of quality benchmarking and independent customer taste testing, which means Asda customers are given the very best in terms of quality and value. Every single one of the products has been tested by real customers up and down the country at 836 locations - and only those that get a big thumbs up make it into the range. Chosen By You has rolled out into Free From products and 4,250 tests have been conducted with the help from Coeliac sufferers. Asda have already conducted more than 370,000 blind taste tests involving 63,714 customers, making this the biggest piece of product testing ever done by a supermarket.

About Asda’s Price Guarantee

With Asda’s Price Guarantee customers can be safe in the knowledge that the price they pay at Asda is cheaper than at Tesco, Sainsbury’s, Morrisons and Waitrose, otherwise we will refund the difference.

ASDA PR Team
Telephone: +44(0)20-3003-6555
email: asda@freud.com

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