Retail Price Watch improves ease of access

"Consumers wishing to compare prices of household goods can now directly access products and brands off the landing page," says Viccy Baker of Red Gekko, publishers of Retail Price Watch. "The site is much easier to navigate and understand."

The independent website can also be accessed through the www.pricecheck.co.za site and mobile app. Smartphones that have a barcode scanner can download the PriceCheck mobile app and scan any product in-store. Product prices will then be shown and users can link to the relevant store to get more information, all comparative prices are listed per product.

The site has received over 56 000 unique visitors and more than 200 000 page views in its first ten months of operation, according to statistics from Google Analytics.

"The purpose of the website is to provide consumers with more choice when it comes to the goods they put in their shopping baskets on a regular basis," continues Baker. "South African consumers are under threat from rising prices and low economic activity and the website offers them a chance to save on their household shopping bills by making more informed choices about what they buy.

"We are currently operating in Johannesburg, Pretoria, Durban, Bloemfontein, the Vaal Triangle, East London, Port Elizabeth and Cape Town."

Prices are gathered by means of handheld bar code scanners, which feed the latest price of a particular product (and the date it was loaded) directly to the website. More than 60 000 prices are updated in any one week and the company has created 14 jobs since inception.

For more information, go to www.retailpricewatch.co.za.