European Supermarket Buys Streaming Service
If the food media is to be believed, American supermarkets are emporiums of white bread, corn syrup, grape jelly, gallon jugs of soda syrup, and chicken. Lots of chicken. Judging from the investment activity of European supermarkets, the situation is a little different on the continent. Last week, J. Sainsbury got into the e-book game. Now, Tesco has purchased We7, a Pandora-esque platform for music streaming. Like J. Sainsbury, who sold print books for years, Tesco has offered CDs. The We7 deal moves Tesco’s music business online. The fragmentation of the supermarket space in the United States across geographic regions—the failure of dominant supermarket conglomerates to edge out alternative, mid-size competitors—has prevented, say Whole Foods or Trader Joe’s, from launching an e-reader or an Internet radio station. Maybe players in the crowded American supermarket space should take some notes from their European confederates and diversify. As long as they keep the chicken on real shelves, not virtual, customers will keep quiet and eat their digital comestibles.
