TWICKENHAM, a suburb in south-west London, is not the sort of place where discount stores traditionally thrive. Its unemployment rate is low; the typical wage is 54% higher than the national average. Yet one of the more successful local businesses is the Poundland store. Since opening in 2010, the shop has become a favourite of the town’s middle-class shoppers.
伦敦西南郊区特威肯纳姆（TWICKENHAM）过去并不是那种折扣店兴旺发达的地方。它的失业率很低；典型的工资比国家平均水平高出54%。当地最成功的生意是Poundland商店。2010年开张以来，商店已经成为镇上中产购物者最青睐的店了。
Garden fertiliser and toys are piled in the windows. On a weekday morning, pensioners and mothers with toddlers browse the aisles buying up bags of crisps, shampoo, books and cheap electronics. Almost everything on sale costs £1.
橱窗里摆满了花园肥料和玩具。周末的早晨，退休者和母亲们带着幼童在超市货架间购买大包小包的炸薯片、洗发香波、书和电子器件。几乎每样东西都卖1英镑。
Little cheer has pervaded Britain’s high streets since the economic downturn began in 2008. The proportion of empty shops has increased from 3% to 14%, according to the Local Data Company, a research firm. But Poundland, which currently has 450 shops, is expanding at a rate of 60 outlets per year. Its competitors are doing almost as well. 99p Stores, a Poundland imitator, is adding 30 shops a year: it has increased its profits by an average of 72% annually over the past three years. Lidl and Aldi, two German discount-supermarket chains, have increased their combined market share by 44% since 2008.
2008年经济衰退以来，英国高街受到冷遇。据研究机构“本地数据”公司（the Local Data Company）统计，闲置商铺的比例从3%上升到14%。而现有450家门店的Poundland商店正以每年60家折扣店的速度扩张。它的竞争对手做得旗鼓相当。Poundland的效仿者99p Stores，正每年增加30家门店。过去三年来它的年利润增长率为72%。两家德国连锁折扣超市Lidl和Aldi自2008年来共增加了44%的市场占有率。
That is perhaps to be expected, given cheap high-street rents and falling real wages. Yet much of the growth at discount retailers no longer comes from the poor. Poundland is expanding fastest in the affluent south-east—as well as Twickenham, new stores have opened in leafy places like Guildford, in Surrey, and Huntingdon, in Cambridgeshire. 99p Stores are opening new shops in more prestigious shopping malls. Lidl and Aldi stock middle-class luxuries such as Parma ham and prosecco wine alongside the baked beans and cheap biscuits.
考虑到高街的廉价租金和下降的实际工资，这样的情况或许在意料之中。然而大多数折扣零售商的增长空间不再来自穷人。Poundland在富裕的西南地区扩张得最为迅速，也包括特威肯纳姆，在萨里的吉尔福德、剑桥郡的亨廷顿这样草木葱茏的地方开了许多新店。99p商店在更上档次的购物中心开设新店。Lidl和Aldi向中产阶层提供帕尔马火腿（Parma Ham）、普洛赛克白葡萄酒（prosecco wine）这样的奢侈品，和烘豆、廉价饼干一道摆放。
According to Edward Garner, an analyst at Kantar, a market-research firm, “consumers are much less sniffy than they were.” They still buy most of their groceries at supermarkets, but top this up with trips to discounters. Cut-price stores still make up less than 10% of the market by volume, according to data from IGD, another market-research firm, but over 40% of shoppers visit at least one monthly. The British have finally realised that “it’s not clever to pay more than you have to”, reckons Jim McCarthy, Poundland’s CEO.
市场调研公司Kantar公司的分析师爱德华•加纳说，“消费者绝没有不屑一顾”，他们仍旧在超市购买多数所需杂货，而这包括了去折扣店购物。另一家市场调研公司IGD的数据显示，折扣店仍然只构成不到10%的市场份额，但超过40%的消费者每月至少去一次。Poundland的CEO吉姆•麦卡锡认为，英国人最终意识到“为不必花的钱买单是愚蠢的”。
Discounters “pick out the easy bits” of supermarkets’ business, says Hussein Lalani, a co-founder of 99p Stores. Shoppers are lured with cheap essentials, such as batteries, shampoo, toothpaste and the like. By not stocking perishables such as fresh fruit or vegetables, discounters keep down their costs. A smaller range helps too. A typical supermarket can contain 25, 000 different items. By contrast, a branch of 99p Stores stocks around 3, 000.
99p的联合创始人侯赛因•拉那尼说道，折扣商店占超市生意的“很小一部分”，消费者被电池、香波、牙膏等廉价必需品所吸引。折扣店通过避免贮存易腐坏食品如新鲜水果和蔬菜来控制成本，缩小经营范围的做法也是同理。典型的超市能容纳25000中不同商品。相比之下，99p商店提供约3000种。
More traditional supermarkets are reacting to this insurgency by stepping up investment in their cheaper own-brand lines. Tesco, by far the biggest supermarket chain in Britain, rebranded its “value” line last year. Sainsbury’s, its main competitor, is trying to adapt too, starting to sell more cheap clothes, household goods and electronics as well as food.
更多的传统超市面对这场变革则采取对自有品牌生产线增加投资。英国目前最大的连锁超市乐购（Tesco）去年为其“宝贵的”生产线塑造品牌。其最大的竞争对手塞恩斯伯里（Sainsbury）也正在设法适应，它开始买更多的便宜衣服、日用商品和电子器件还有食品。
A risk lurks here for supermarkets however. Value ranges sell briskly, but if they cannibalise sales of more profitable products, the result may be a net loss. Thus the rise of the cheap shops is set to continue. In Germany, where until recently real wages had been stagnant for decades, discount stores account for 40% of the market. The new British appetite for a bargain could well outlive the recession.
然而对超市来说潜伏着危机。价格迅速影响着销售，但如果他们改售高利润产品的话，结果可能会净亏损。如此一来，廉价商店顺理成章得以兴起。在德国，由于实际工资十年未变，折扣商店占到了40%的市场份额。英国人对便宜货的新胃口会有助于度过经济衰退。
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