Grocery is one of the toughest corners of retail to get right.

It’s high volume, low margin, operationally complex and intensely personal. Yes, shoppers may admire fashion retailers, browse beauty brands or enjoy destination homeware stores, but they rely on grocers. The weekly shop sits close to household budgets, family routines, health, convenience and trust.

That makes excellence in grocery retail hard to fake.

A great grocer is the retailer that manages to combine commercial performance with customer understanding, operational discipline and a constant ability to adapt.

That is what the Grocer of the Year category at the RG Retail Excellence Awards 2026 has been designed to recognise.

The award celebrates grocery retailers that have delivered standout performance over the past year, while also proving they can meet the shifting expectations of customers who are more value-conscious, more time-poor and more discerning than ever.

At its best, grocery retail is a balancing act. Customers want sharp prices, but not at the expense of quality. They want choice, but not overwhelming complexity. They want convenience, but they also expect availability, freshness and reliability. They want to feel that the retailer understands the pressure on household finances, while still giving them reasons to enjoy the shopping experience.

The grocers that stand apart are those that have found a way to deliver across all of those expectations without losing sight of the basics.

Availability remains one of the clearest tests of grocery excellence. When customers make a trip to store or place an online order, they expect the products they need to be there. A strong grocer understands that availability is a trust issue. Empty shelves, missing favourites and unreliable substitutions all chip away at customer confidence.

Range matters too, of course. The strongest grocery retailers know how to serve different missions, whether that means the quick top-up shop, the family weekly shop, the premium treat, the health-conscious basket or the budget-led meal plan. A compelling range is not about endless duplication. It is about knowing what customers need, editing intelligently and giving shoppers genuine reasons to choose one retailer over another.

Value has also become a defining measure of grocery leadership. The best grocers do not treat value as a short-term promotional tactic. They build it into the proposition through pricing, own-label development, loyalty, quality and clarity. They help customers feel in control of their spend, without making the shopping experience feel stripped back or purely transactional.

That customer-first decision making is what separates good retailers from truly exemplary ones.

Over the past year, the most impressive grocers have had to respond to changing shopper priorities with pace and precision. Some have strengthened entry-price ranges; some have sharpened loyalty schemes. Some have invested in convenience formats, online capacity, faster fulfilment or better fresh food execution. Others have focused on improving the in-store experience, simplifying the shop or making quality more visible to customers.

What matters for awards entries is not just the action taken, but the evidence behind it.

The Grocer of the Year judges will be looking for tangible performance metrics. That could include sales growth, market share gains, improvements in availability, stronger customer satisfaction scores, basket growth, repeat purchase, loyalty engagement, reduced waste, better fulfilment accuracy or measurable supply chain improvements.

The strongest entries will be able to show a clear line between the decisions made, and the results achieved.

Operational excellence will also be vital. Grocery retail depends on thousands of moving parts working together, from procurement and forecasting to logistics, store execution, digital channels and colleague performance. An exemplary grocer is one that can make complexity feel simple for the customer.

That might mean improving forecasting to reduce gaps on shelf, or building more resilient supplier relationships. It could mean using data more intelligently to match range and stock to local demand or making stores more efficient, more sustainable or easier for colleagues to run.

The judges will want to understand which operational or supply chain improvements made a material difference, and how those improvements affected customers, colleagues and commercial performance.

Customer trust is another vital marker, that’s built through repetition. It comes from consistently fair pricing, dependable product quality, good availability, helpful colleagues, responsible sourcing, clear communication and the sense that the retailer is on the customer’s side.

The most compelling entries will show how trust and satisfaction are measured, rather than simply claimed. That could include NPS, customer satisfaction scores, complaints data, loyalty insight, online reviews, retention metrics or evidence of improved customer perception.

Ultimately, Grocer of the Year will recognise a retailer that has performed strongly across the fundamentals, while continuing to move forward.

It’s for the grocer that has protected availability while sharpening value, or innovated without overcomplicating the customer experience. And, the grocer that has used operational strength to earn customer loyalty.

The RG Retail Excellence Awards 2026 offer a chance to put that achievement in front of an expert judging panel and the wider retail industry.

Entries for Grocer of the Year are now open, with the deadline extended until the end of June. A wider range of categories will be recognised for excellence across UK retail.

Retailers can view the full list of categories and enter here: https://awards.retailgazette.co.uk/categories/