Lidl treat journalists to ‘flash’ 3 course spread – for less than £10 a head
By Rich Leigh on Thursday, August 28, 2014
German supermarket Lidl – which has been gaining ground on the other supermarkets as of late for its no frills pricing – held a swanky dinner at London’s Victoria & Albert Museum last night.
The evening, attended by many national consumer journalists, was described as a chance to meet UK boss Ronny Gottschlich, who made a number of announcements.
First up was a new £20m TV ad campaign, debuted last night. The ‘LidlSurprises’ ad, according to this piece on the Express, ‘shows shoppers visiting a farmers’ market in London’s East End where they are surprised at what good value the fresh produce is – only to be told upon purchase that their shopping items were sourced from the German chain’.
Gottschlich also told how the chain has plans to create 5,000 jobs over the next five years as part of a £220million UK expansion programme, by increasing the number of its UK stores from 600 to between 1,200 and 1,500.
All this sounds lovely – but isn’t the reason it’s on this site. Here’s the menu, as tweeted by the Telegraph’s Harry Wallop. Sounds nice, right?
At a flash @LidlUK dinner at V&A. Here’s menu… Asparagus panna cotta anyone? pic.twitter.com/6z3tDbJhNO
— Harry Wallop (@hwallop) August 27, 2014
And here, after the meal, is a receipt given to each of the 185 diners, showing the cost of each ingredient at Lidl – and that the ‘flash’ 3 course menu had cost less than £10 per head.
Clever. At end of swanky @LidlUK dinner at V&A last night, guests given receipt showing cost of all Lidl ingredients pic.twitter.com/7k9Tv2MQby
— Harry Wallop (@hwallop) August 28, 2014
This PR flourish turned a number of fairly dry financial commitments over a nice dinner into something altogether-more relatable and interesting. Nice job, Lidl.
Thanks to Emily Urban-Smith for emailing with this