Spar and Aldi top Drinks Retail Websites Table

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Spar (UK) made a return to form by jointly topping the table of the Top 25 UK’s leading drinks retailing websites for August, although it was helped by Aldi delivering a weaker performance this month.

The German supermarket chain managed to score 7.62 out of 10 compared with its impressive 8.34 of last month. This modest bit of movement at the top sits well with the rest of the table that has enjoyed a period of stability as 10 retailers are holding the same position as last month – compared with only two previously.

The top 10 was especially consistent in its performance as six merchants are holding the same spots, according to the monthly table of UK websites for drinks retailers, produced exclusively for Retailinsider.com by website testing specialist Sitemorse.

To produce the rankings Sitemorse runs automated software that page-by-page reads the first 125 pages of each website and analyses on the basis of six key criteria - function, code quality, user experience, accessibility, performance and SEO capability.

The other changes among the top grouping were the climb of one place by Iceland into eighth spot, and the decline of two places by Naked Wines into 10^th spot, which followed its impressive rise of 14 places last month.

The biggest gainer was Tesco that climbed three places into 16^th spot with a score of 3.10, which is a marginal gain on the 2.90 it scored last month, which suggests the scoring at the bottom end of the table was lower than in July.

The biggest faller was EH Booth that slipped four places to 15^th spot with a score of 3.56 out of 10. It was just beaten by Londis that returned to the table having been excluded from testing in July.

Disappointingly one retailer was still excluded from the Sitemorse testing, with Sainsbury’s again not included in the Top 25 table because of its reliance on JavaScript.

Other fallers this month included heavyweights Marks & Spencer, which declined four places to 20^th spot, and Waitrose, slipped two places to 23^rd spot. It managed to beat only one operator, the Sunday Times Wine Club, which scored 1.79 out of 10, which is exactly the same poor score that it achieved in July.

Top 25 Drinks Retail Websites – Aug 2012

Company Name                      +/-       Score out of 10

1.      Spar (UK)                     +1        7.62

2.      Aldi                              same   7.62    

3.      The Whisky Shop         same   6.74

4.      Fortnum & Mason       same   6.24

5.      Budgens                      same   6.22

6.      Bargain Booze             same   6.12

7.      Lidl                              same   5.19

8.      Iceland                         +1        5.10

9.      Londis                          new     5.10

10.  Naked Wines               -2         4.90

11.  The Wine Society        +1        4.10

12.  BeerMerchants.com   +1        3.96                

13.  Majestic Wine             +2        3.84

14.  The Drink Shop            same   3.77

15.  EH Booth & Co           -5         3.56

16.  Tesco                           +3        3.10

17.  Selfridges                    same   3.10

18.  Asda                            +2        3.10

19.  Slurp.co.uk                  -1         3.04

20.  Marks & Spencer        -4         2.94

21.  Virgin Wines               +2        2.76

22.  Laithwaites                  same   2.04

23.  Waitrose                     -2         1.86

24.  Sun Times Wine Club  same   1.79

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