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19th Sep 2018

Tesco opens discount store Jack’s to rival Aldi and Lidl

Kyle Picknell

If you come at the king(s) you best not miss

Tesco has arranged a bunch of school rucksacks into a loose circle on the playground. They’ve aggressively pointed out Aldi and Lidl from the rapidly forming crowd, the two overwhelmingly popular foreign exchange students that have come over for the term and stolen all Tesco’s birds, and all of Tesco’s low, low prices. Tesco isn’t having it. Tesco isn’t having any of it. They’ve thrown their blazer down. They’ve rolled up their sleeves.

This is it. Tesco wants it. Tesco wants this settled. Now. Tesco is suddenly calling itself Jack in a bid to appear hard.

Hold on. What?

Yeah, you heard that right.

Tesco is now Jack, or at least some part of it is, following the launch of a new store set to take on the discount duopoly of Aldi and Lidl.

The new store will sell mostly British produced food and drink “at the lowest possible prices” and be laid out in much the same way as its German counterparts: large spacious aisles, bargain bins full of random shit you’ll probably never need like a leaf blower for 20 quid or some Croc ripoffs or some fancy salad tongs made out of walnut.

Tesco chief executive Dave Lewis said: “It’s about being cheapest in town. No other retail offer in the UK matches that proposition.”

The first two Jack’s stores opened today in Chatteris, Cambridgeshire and Immingham, Lincolnshire, with another 10-15 locations set to open in the next six months.

Tesco is still the big bad bully of the supermarket world, for now, boasting 27.4% market share. This could, however, rapidly dwindle with the recent news of a £14 billion merger between ASDA and Sainsbury’s and the continued fact that Aldi and Lidl are just… really, really great? There is always a fantastic selection of bread. There is always some great, albeit curiously named, continental beers you’ve never heard of. Their gin is legitimately better than most actual gin brands.

These things are important to the Great British public, and suddenly calling yourself Jack and selling bread for 20p less might not change not. But we’ll see, won’t we, Jack. If that even is your real name.