Why does Marks and Spencer's food taste so good compared to other supermarket brands?

ibstar

It seems everything I ever try from there always tastes that much nicer compared to other supermarket brands or other brands in general.
So what's their secret?

hmm...I couldn't agree to be honest.
Their bread is horrible IMO

km991148

Same as any food - lots of fat and sugar!

A lot of the M&S stuff is particularly unhealthy (i.e. the dine in for two etc). A lot of the fresh stuff is bought close to being perfectly ripe etc.

Other stuff is just made to more expensive recipes as they do not necessarily compete on price as per (for example dunnes or asda or the discounters/ freezer shops).

ibstar

Deleted User wrote: »

hmm...I couldn't agree to be honest.
Their bread is horrible IMO

km991148 wrote: »

lots of fat and sugar!

Was about to say their bread has a sweet tone to it's smell.

km991148

some of the pre packed bread is auful - but I had a nice sourdough from them the other day. ALso they have reasonable nice fresh soups that arent too bad.

Obv the above are generilisations - they have many lines and have tried to diversify and some of the lines they appear to be using to compete with other supermarkets.

Shenshen

I'm not sold on their Wensleydale, it's very bland.
The only thing I keep buying in M&S is their strong bread flour. That really does make a difference.

GreenFolder2

Some of their food is genuinely very well put together and they've extremely good fruit and veg, but they've also got huge blind spots. Their cheese selection is very bland and uninteresting and their bread is mostly terrible. Is it an English thing generally? I think they've only recently woken up to good bread?

A lot of their products are just high quality ready meals or semi prepared foods so, you're really just looking at things that have been chef designed to taste good.

As with all ready meals, read carefully as they can be very heavy on sauces and so on.

They're an interesting niche supermarket though with a lot of unique products. Certainly not somewhere I would go for the basics.

They've also some annoyances like they don't stock milk in cartons. I hate milk from those plastic jug containers. It tastes different, possibly because of exposure to light?

Also often they seem to use very odd imperial measures used translated into metric rather than round metric numbers. I think that's more just a British stubbornness to stick to imperial standards and try to prove to themselves that the metric system is complicated though.

RasTa

Airplane food is how i describe all their pre packed stuff.

Their meat(steaks etc) aren't very good either

MeatTwoVeg

I suspect it's 80% advertising and 20% fats and sugars.

kylith

Their chocolate's manky too. But I find them good for the unusual stuff that you wouldn't get in Tesco.

BuffyBot

A lot of it is impression tbh. In a blind taste test, I'd wager most couldn't call the difference in most products and quality brands from Tesco/Dunnes/Aldi/Lidl etc

In a few categories, they will beat out others on quality but price will also factor into it.

newacc2015

OP I would have agreed with you 15 years ago. But I think food sold in most supermarkets is as good, if not superior to M&S. I dont think any of the pork products in M&S are particularly amazing. Lidl's Irish produced dairy is often better than M&S's.

IMO a lot of brand have reduced their sugar, salt and fat at the cost of losing some favour. M&S hasnt as I imagine they realise most consumers only eat their products the odd time. Even massive companies like Pepsi Co are trying to make their foods more healthy at the cost of favour. I havent seen any effort of that in M&S.

Oafley Jones

newacc2015 wrote: »

OP I would have agreed with you 15 years ago. But I think food sold in most supermarkets is as good, if not superior to M&S. I dont think any of the pork products in M&S are particularly amazing. Lidl's Irish produced dairy is often better than M&S's.

IMO a lot of brand have reduced their sugar, salt and fat at the cost of losing some favour. M&S hasnt as I imagine they realise most consumers only eat their products the odd time. Even massive companies like Pepsi Co are trying to make their foods more healthy at the cost of favour. I havent seen any effort of that in M&S.

Back in the 90s, early 00s they were so far ahead of the game. And then they seemed to rest on their laurels. Don't get me wrong some of their stuff is great (e.g. their super skinny smoked rashers are the only decent ones out there, cumberland sausages are lovely, some of the newer packaged meals can be excellent as can those interesting and expensive bites) but there's a vast amount of product that's changed very little in almost 20 years.

Did I mention expensive. Anytime I go in there a small bag of groceries seems to cost 50 euro. I'd rate a lot of Lidl/aldi christmas stuff as far better. Bought a packet of 12 macaroons in Aldi, they were 3.99. Same size pack is a whopping 15.99 in M&S. I preferred Aldi's chocolate and vanilla flavoured ones.

GreenFolder2

In the mid 2000s they had really nice semi-prepared products and ethnic foods, particularly curries etc.

However, in recent years it seems they've decided to go all conservative and it's all rather heavy, stodgy stuff filling their shelves now.

Also, I find they've a particular "look" which I don't like. Boots has it too. It's a kind of bland, very British (in a Hyacinth bucket meets the NHS and British Rail of the 1980s kind of way), very conservative decor where everything's a bit beige and looks like it's been fitted to BS-13459:Magolia-Dull. Even their in-store Christmas displays are just that kind of weird, conservative vibe and lack that bit of fun and spark of energy.

Also, one thing I do not get with the UK chains here is why they don't localise properly.

M&S does it a bit and actually Tesco is worse, have a tendency to just stock English items including things emblazoned with Union Jacks and "Best of British" etc.. I was in Tesco there recently and picked up a double adaptor for a phone and brought it home to discover it was a BT style one. Why even bother selling that in Ireland, it doesn't fit the wall sockets.

rubadub

Oafley Jones wrote: »

Back in the 90s, early 00s they were so far ahead of the game. .

Have not been in M&S for a good while, and have tried only a few items, but I remember we used to get stuff at christmas from there. It costed a hell of a lot more, and back then there were no "tesco finest", "dunnes simply better" range etc (some of which are not great).

People are claiming its unhealthy or loaded with this & that. I am not familiar enough with their stuff and have no idea what people are singling out. I will say that with "tesco finest" or "dunnes simply better" the products are indeed often much higher in calories, fat, sugar etc per 100g, but that is since they are not the watered down muck their cheaper ranges often are. They would be more similar to the levels of salt etc you might get in a high priced restaurant, who do not have to declare a thing.

e.g. tesco finest korma has more cream and coconut as I would expect, so some might call that "more unhealthy"
https://www.tesco.ie/groceries/Product/Details/?id=255855225
https://www.tesco.ie/groceries/Product/Details/?id=252548070

With a lot of the supposed decent brands or "brand leaders" you are paying over the odds for advertising costs, so it should be fairly easy to make a product with superior ingredients at a cheaper or same price, e.g. heinz ketchup, guinness, coca cola, hellmans mayo. Some hold up those brands as the definitive brand to compare against, even though many who bother to try others would consider them nothing particularly special.

madanall

People associate M+S with superior quality . It sells the same products in many cases as other supermarkets , just packaged differently. In other words , they use the same suppliers. Their Ready meals can be nice but they charge a Premium for them.

The Rape of Lucretia

Dont know what yiz are on about.
M&S are fab, and their quality is better across the board than any other supermarket. It is pricier than the other certainly, and up to each and her purse to decide whether it is worth it. But price aside, I find it hard to believe anyone could consider them at the same level, inconsistent, or even below any of its competitors. Quality of the raw materials, variety, prepared meals and deserts, convenience, seasonal specials, bread, fruit, and vegetables - there is simply no one to touch them.

The Rape of Lucretia

madanall wrote: »

People associate M+S with superior quality . It sells the same products in many cases as other supermarkets , just packaged differently.

Give a few examples. I have never found this, and am familiar with a wide-ish range of their standard fare.

Mellor

The Rape of Lucretia wrote: »

Give a few examples. I have never found this, and am familiar with a wide-ish range of their standard fare.

For example, you mentioned their fruit and veg in your list above.
They aren't actually produce their own fruits and veg. But buy it from other producers just like everyone else. The people sell to M&S are probably selling to plenty of other retailers. It's the same produce.

The same applies for a large number of own brand items in lots of supermarkets

iora_rua

The Rape of Lucretia wrote: »

Dont know what yiz are on about.
M&S are fab, and their quality is better across the board than any other supermarket. It is pricier than the other certainly, and up to each and her purse to decide whether it is worth it. But price aside, I find it hard to believe anyone could consider them at the same level, inconsistent, or even below any of its competitors. Quality of the raw materials, variety, prepared meals and deserts, convenience, seasonal specials, bread, fruit, and vegetables - there is simply no one to touch them.

I'm hopping mad that any attempt by M&S to open a store in Limerick has been frustrated at every turn! At this stage, I would settle for a food only branch to save having to hike to Dublin or Cork.

reubenreuben

Looking at the ingredients on pre prepared foods they tend to use more natural products. Reason why they cost more.

Zelda247

I worked in the Food Dept at M&S Head office for 6 months a few years back and I can tell you that they research and vet all their suppliers constantly and all the food it trialled and tested to the highest level.

They also ensure the best quality ingredients are used in their products, yes they are expensive but recently we bought an Aldi Speciality Range Chicken Arrabbiata and an M&S one and there was no contest, M&S won hands down in the taste test.