Supermarket giant and wholesaler Morrisons is sharpening its focus on the forecourt sector as it aims to increase the 500 or so filling stations currently signed up to its Daily convenience offering.
The firm has 1,700 Daily stores across the forecourt and convenience sectors, 700 being franchise run, and aims to open its 2,000th in 2026.
Morrisons’ head of wholesale for strategic projects and acquisitions, Victoria Lockie, sat down with Forecourt Trader to share her insights into what the firm can offer retailers, and why forecourts feature prominently in its expansion plans.
“People now realise that forecourts are convenience stores with fuel in a lot of cases”, Lockie explains. “It’s not just a forecourt, it’s something much bigger than that: often it’s a community hub as well.”
Lockie says the firm has “already seen a lot of success” with the roughly 100 Rontec and 340 or so MFG forecourts that have signed up to Morrisons Daily for shop supplies and branding.
A further 50 independent fuel retailers have opted to go with the brand, and Lockie says more are set to join in the near future. “The pipeline is extremely rich, and we’ve got some really cracking forecourts coming to the party, some of them in the Top 50 Indies”.
Lockie is clearly an advocate for Daily, but she makes a compelling case for it nonetheless. “On average we see 20% plus growth in sales when we put Morrisons above the door”, she says, adding that the firm is “very agile and can flex our proposition so it meets small, medium or large stores”, while also working well in both community-based forecourts and more transient sites.
Having joined Morrisons in May after 27 years with Costcutter and 14 with Nisa, plus a stint as a director at Unitas, Lockie is well placed to judge Morrisons’ offer, which she says is “one of the best store-launch paths” she’s ever seen. “We manage all the merchandising and planograms, and they are perfection”.
She highlights successes like the new-to-sector Castleford forecourt in West Yorkshire (seen in lead image), which opted for Morrisons Daily, and has quickly built up a “huge fanbase” over social media and in the local community.
She adds that established operators with “independent brands that are exceptionally strong” can be work with the firm’s ‘Together With Morrisons’ offering, which allows retailers to use the firm for wholesale supply, while maintaining their identity and local supplier connections.
Other talking points include the brand’s 125-year heritage, the new ‘Spend Stretch’ promotion that lets customers using the More Card accrue 1,500 loyalty points when they spend over £15 in franchised Daily stores, plus Morrisons’ ownership of Myton Food Group.
Myton packs and processes everything from fresh meat and fish, to fruit, veg and bread, giving the company vertical supply integration that helps reduce prices for retailers, while also allowing Morrisons to support on British farming.
“The fact we’ve got all these companies: fisheries, farms, egg farms, everything in the UK – the British nation wants to support farmers and British production”, Lockie says. “There aren’t many players out there that do what we do.”
Another benefit Daily sites gain is a facility that allows them to purchase items from Morrisons supermarkets at wholesale prices, should they run out of critical supplies in-between deliveries.
“You can order via our portal and turn up at that store, meet the manager and they will give you the products at wholesale prices. It’s there as a fallback, and some retailers really enjoy that”, Lockie explains.
Wholesalers have never been so keen to supply the thriving forecourt sector, and while Morrisons’ offering clearly brings its own advantages, the fact so many firms are competing for retailers’ business can only be to operators’ benefit.
