The rise and fall of British supermarkets

Aldi and Lidl hold only small portions of the market despite their recent rapid growth, with a combined market share of 8.4pc in July 2014.

Over the last 40 years, a collection of retailers have come and gone.

Gateway, which later became Somerfield, built a market share of more than 10pc in the late 1980s before dipping to below 4pc and eventually being sold to the Co-operative Group in 2008.

In addition, British discounter KwikSave peaked at 9.6pc of the market in 1993 before enduring a slow demise over the next 15 years. Safeway held 11.3pc of the market in 2001 before being acquired by Morrisons three years later.

The data for the graph is from Kantar Worldpanel.

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