Waitrose has been ranked last among six major UK supermarkets for the shelf life of fresh food in an online grocery delivery investigation by Which?. Budget-friendly supermarket Asda topped the ranking, delivering the freshest groceries overall.
The consumer champion sent 12 mystery shoppers to place identical online orders with Asda, Morrisons, Ocado, Sainsbury's, Tesco, and Waitrose over a two-week period. The shoppers then calculated the average number of full hours remaining between delivery and the product's use-by date.
Waitrose fresh food had an average of just 7.7 days left to use. The supermarket performed poorly for items such as scones, bread, fresh pasta sauce, fresh tagliatelle, houmous, and pork sausages. In one instance, two packs of Waitrose beef mince and a pack of chicken thighs arrived with a use-by date just one day after delivery.
Tesco also received criticism, with an average shelf life of 8.8 days. Some shoppers received fresh pasta sauce and pork sausages with only 3.4 days remaining, falling short of Tesco's own online guidance which suggests at least a week for pasta sauce and five days for pork sausages.
Sainsbury's followed with an average shelf life of 10.2 days, though some deliveries included items with short dates, such as sweetcorn and basil that had a best-before date on the day of arrival, or chicken thighs with a use-by date the next day.
Ocado generally delivered products with longer shelf lives, including honey roast ham with more than 20 days remaining. However, one shopper received basil described as black and wilted, despite being technically in date.
Morrisons performed well overall, but a substituted raspberry trifle had less than four hours left before it expired, and another shopper received an opened pot of pineapple that had leaked.
Asda was identified as the biggest winner, with fresh groceries overall. Five shoppers received beef mince with at least 18 days remaining, and one pack of cod had seven days left. A tomato and mascarpone pasta sauce from Asda had an average of 33.6 days remaining, compared to 12.2 days for the same product from Waitrose, which was also 23p more expensive.
The investigation highlighted that some products, such as pre-cut carrots, were repeatedly found to be 'slimy', 'wet,' or 'manky' across different supermarkets.
According to a Which? survey, 16% of people who had experienced issues with their most recent online supermarket delivery cited receiving perishable items with very short shelf lives as their primary frustration. Reena Sewraz, Which? retail editor, stated that shoppers expect a reasonable amount of time to use fresh food and that supermarkets must ensure their freshness promises are met to prevent consumers from having to rush meal plans or discard purchased groceries.