Abstract
This conceptual review paper explores food retail space saturation in the UK in the light of an apparent recent peak of store space growth, an inferred decline of the hypermarket format, and, in particular, the stagnation and subsequent deterioration in performance of the UK market leader, Tesco. Despite saturation being widely discussed by retail executives and analysts, the last significant academic work in this area occurred in the mid-1990s. In this paper, we develop an understanding of retail saturation that rests on a spatial conceptualisation of retail development at a local catchment level and rationalise why, and in what ways, saturation manifests itself through sales impacts and cannibalisation. In the process, we analyse the differing local effects of new store openings, store extensions and format innovation to illustrate how saturation is contingent upon local catchment conditions, competitive interactions and the particular geography of retail brands and formats. Although a significant slow-down in new store construction may be a logical response at the level of the industry, this may not necessarily be the case for individual retail firms.