Asda escalates Argos price attack with electronics campaign

Asda is ramping up its attack on Argos with a television campaign highlighting its claim that its big-brand consumer electronic products are significantly cheaper than those sold by its rival.

Asda: Big toy rollback campaign launched earlier this month
Asda: Big toy rollback campaign launched earlier this month

The supermarket is launching the electronics campaign, created by Saatchi & Saatchi, after kicking off a 'Big toy rollback' campaign on 12 October, which compares prices on toy brands with Argos.

Asda is drawing attention to Argos' prices on non-food ranges in the run-up to Christmas, by using the technology of price monitoring firm Skuuudle.

Television activity focusing on the differences launches tonight (24 October) on ITV1.

The aggressive marketing push by Asda follows on from Home Retail Group, the owner of Argos, seeing off a takeover bid from Asda parent company Walmart last year.

Asda claims that the undercutting of Argos prices on some individual products is equivalent to the value of an average weekly family shop.

Brands included in the price war include Nikon, Canon, Samsung and Sony.

Asda says the cost of its Sony C69I iPod Dock at £87 is 24% cheaper than the Argos price of £114.99.

The supermarket chain claims it has invested £10m in the 'Big toy rollback’ scheme, but has not revealed how much it is investing in undercutting Argos' prices on consumer electronics.

Asda took a further swipe at Argos last week by launching its first Christmas gift guide, a 204-page catalogue of which eight million copies are being delivered to nationwide stores.

Last week, with profits plunging from £54.4m to £3.4m, after sales dropped to £1.68bn from the previous year's figure of £1.81bn.

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