Supermarket loyalty programs are mainstream in the United Kingdom and widely used in Australia. The figures below show how many shoppers belong to schemes, how loyalty prices affect perceptions and store choice, how members compare prices, and how Tesco Clubcard activity has developed. UK figures come from the GOV.UK Review of loyalty pricing in the groceries sector, while Australian figures come from the ACCC Supermarkets Inquiry 2024–2025 interim report. Tesco-specific figures are reported in Tesco annual and interim reports for the stated financial periods.
Contents
- Membership is widespread
- How shoppers view loyalty pricing
- Data, personalization, and trust
- Effects on store choice and price comparison
- Rewards and everyday shopping behavior
- Tesco Clubcard scale and activity
Membership is widespread
The GOV.UK review found that 97% of UK shoppers belonged to at least one supermarket loyalty scheme. UK shoppers had an average of three supermarket loyalty-scheme memberships, and 21% belonged to five or more schemes. This suggests that a meal planner may encounter several competing loyalty offers during an ordinary weekly shop rather than relying on a single program.
Among regular grocery shoppers surveyed in the UK, Tesco Clubcard was used by 77% and Sainsbury’s Nectar Card by 57%. These are survey-use measures for the named schemes, not estimates of all registered accounts.
Recent joining was also substantial: 27% of UK shoppers said they had joined a supermarket loyalty scheme in the previous 12 months. Among those new joiners, 27% said access to loyalty prices was a primary motivation. Lidl Plus was used by 30% of new joiners, the highest share among schemes with recent joiners in the review, followed by Asda Rewards at 27%.
The Australian ACCC survey reported that 81% of respondents belonged to at least one supermarket loyalty program, while 51% belonged to at least two. The two national results are not directly interchangeable: they come from different countries, surveys, and reporting contexts.
| Membership measure | Result | Geography or group |
|---|---|---|
| At least one supermarket scheme | 97% | UK shoppers |
| Five or more supermarket schemes | 21% | UK shoppers |
| At least one supermarket program | 81% | ACCC survey respondents |
| At least two supermarket programs | 51% | ACCC survey respondents |
For meal planning, broad membership can make the practical question less about whether to join and more about which offers fit the planned basket. A membership may be useful for a regular shop, but the statistics do not show that joining automatically lowers a household’s total food bill.
How shoppers view loyalty pricing
Across the five supermarkets studied in the GOV.UK review, average loyalty-price savings for members ranged from 17% to 25%. The review also found that branded products accounted for 58% to 90% of products on loyalty-price promotion across those five retailers. Average loyalty dual-price promotion length ranged from 17 to 26 days.
Shoppers recognized the potential value but did not agree on the fairness of the pricing model. Sixty-nine percent said loyalty pricing offers good savings for members, and 60% trusted that loyalty prices provide savings against the usual price. At the same time, 43% said it was unfair for loyalty members to pay lower prices than non-members for some products. Fifty-five percent thought the non-member price during a loyalty promotion was generally inflated.
Loyalty pricing was also one factor among several that could influence supermarket choice. In the UK review, 26% said loyalty-price promotions were the promotion most likely to make them shop at a particular supermarket. However, 76% said loyalty pricing had not changed where they shopped over the previous 12 months. The result was different by age: 89% of shoppers over 70 said their shopping location had not changed, compared with 65% of shoppers aged 18 to 29.
The Australian evidence shows a similar split between influence and non-influence. Forty-seven percent of ACCC survey respondents said loyalty programs did not influence where they shopped at all. Thirty-six percent said they influenced store choice a little or somewhat, while 17% said they influenced it a lot. Loyalty-program features were among the factors used to choose a main grocery store for 25% of respondents.
These figures matter when building a meal plan around promotions. A discounted ingredient can support a planned recipe, but a loyalty promotion is not the same as a discount on the full basket. The available measures describe average promotional savings and shopper perceptions; they do not establish a universal saving for every household or every trip.
Data, personalization, and trust
The UK review found that 72% of shoppers were aware that supermarkets would collect personal data each time they shopped when they signed up for a loyalty scheme. Comfort with different uses of that information varied considerably.
Sixty-one percent felt comfortable with supermarkets using loyalty data to send personalized offers. That fell to 32% for sharing anonymized data with other companies to understand shopping habits, and to 17% for sharing individual data so other companies could send personalized promotions.
Personal-data concerns were not the main reason most non-members stayed outside a scheme. Only 7% of non-members who regularly shopped for groceries said concerns about personal data were why they had not joined. This indicates that non-members may be weighing other considerations, although the supplied UK review figures do not quantify those other reasons.
For shoppers planning meals, personalized offers can be relevant when they match products already on a list. The statistics do not show whether personalized offers reduce food waste, change recipe choices, or improve the nutritional quality of a meal plan. They only describe reported awareness and comfort with data practices.
Effects on store choice and price comparison
In the UK, 69% said loyalty pricing had not affected how much they compared prices across supermarkets compared with 12 months earlier. Twenty-four percent said they now compared prices more because of loyalty pricing. This leaves a smaller reported group moving in the opposite direction, but the supplied figures do not provide a complete breakdown for that remainder.
The ACCC report gives more detail on comparison habits among members and non-members.
| Price-comparison behavior | Loyalty-program members | Non-members |
|---|---|---|
| Always compare prices between stores | 28% | 16% |
| Compare selected needed products that week | 46% | 45% |
| Compare a wide range of needed products that week | 17% | 11% |
The ACCC results suggest that members in that survey were more likely than non-members to report always comparing stores or comparing a wide range of needed products. They were not uniformly more likely to compare selected products: 46% of members did so, compared with 45% of non-members.
A practical meal-planning workflow can use this distinction. Compare the prices of the ingredients that determine the week’s cost, especially proteins, produce, and pantry staples, while treating loyalty prices as one price point to check. The survey results support price comparison as a reported behavior, but they do not measure the final savings produced by that behavior.
Rewards and everyday shopping behavior
The ACCC survey found that 60% of respondents used loyalty programs to collect and redeem points for future grocery purchases. Fourteen percent used programs to earn points or rewards on non-grocery purchases, and 14% used them to access cheaper prices. These categories describe reported uses and should not be added together as if each respondent selected only one use.
When choosing whether to buy an item, 52% of loyalty-program members said they considered rewards only if they would otherwise buy the item. Twenty-four percent said they did not consider rewards at all, while 25% said rewards made them more likely or much more likely to buy an item.
The ACCC also reported different responses to a special-item product list: 20% of Everyday Rewards members selected only the cheaper price, compared with 28% of IGA Rewards members and 4% of Flybuys members. The report labels these as program-specific survey results, so the percentages should be read within their respective member groups rather than as a universal ranking of program value.
Shopping frequency also differed between members and non-members. Fifty-two percent of loyalty-program members did one large weekly shop and a few smaller top-up shops, compared with 44% of non-members. Twenty-one percent of members did a number of smaller shops throughout the week, compared with 32% of non-members.
For a meal-planning guide, the weekly-shop figures are especially useful as context. A plan designed around one main shop may need a different list structure from a plan designed around several smaller trips. The statistics do not show that loyalty membership caused either shopping pattern.
Tesco Clubcard scale and activity
Tesco’s own reports provide a detailed example of a large supermarket loyalty operation. In Tesco’s 2023 annual report, Clubcard sales penetration reached 83% in Central Europe, nearly 77% in the Republic of Ireland, and nearly 79% in the UK. Tesco reported 21 million active Clubcard households, 11.7 million Clubcard app users in the UK, 2 million in Central Europe, and 0.7 million in the Republic of Ireland.
The same 2023 report said Tesco had rolled out individualized digital coupons to 4 million UK customers and that its Media and Insight platform was working with more than 450 consumer-goods brands. The report also said the number of active Clubcard holders in Central Europe trebled during the year. This is a company-reported change over the stated year, not an independently verified estimate.
Tesco’s 2024 annual report reported Clubcard penetration of 79% in the UK, 77% in the Republic of Ireland, and 83% in Central Europe for FY2023/24. It reported about 8,000 Clubcard promotions available each week, more than 10 billion Clubcard points issued across January and February during a double-points event, and 12.7 million customers engaged with the Tesco app by year end. Tesco said app engagement had increased by over 40% since the rollout of Clubcard Prices in March 2022.
| Tesco measure | Reported result | Reporting period |
|---|---|---|
| UK Clubcard penetration | 79% | FY2023/24 |
| Republic of Ireland penetration | 77% | FY2023/24 |
| Central Europe penetration | 83% | FY2023/24 |
| Weekly Clubcard promotions | About 8,000 | FY2023/24 |
| Tesco app engagement | 12.7 million customers | Year end, FY2023/24 |
| Clubcard points issued in January and February | More than 10 billion | FY2023/24 event |
Tesco’s FY2024/25 interim results reported a first double Clubcard-points event that ran for seven weeks. Clubcard sales penetration was 82% in the UK, 85% in the Republic of Ireland, and 87% in Central Europe in those interim results. Tesco also reported that 4.9 million customers received Clubcard Challenges tailored to their shopping habits.
The Tesco figures illustrate the scale and targeting of a mature loyalty system, but they are not a direct measure of household savings. For meal planning, the useful takeaway is narrower: a large program can provide frequent promotions and personalized offers, while the value of any particular offer still depends on whether the discounted product belongs in the planned shop.