High Temperatures: How Are Retailers Performing in the UK?

As temperatures rise again across Western Europe, demand for chilled drinks, ice cream and barbecue essentials is expected to increase. For retailers, these periods create an operational challenge: making sure the products consumers expect to find are still on the shelf. To understand how well stores cope when temperatures climb, Roamler audited four major UK supermarket chains during a recent heatwave — checking whether fridges and freezers were operating correctly, how full they were, and whether popular summer products were still available on shelves.

Freezers Are Under Pressure

Across the stores we visited, drinks fridges averaged a 68% fill level, while ice cream freezers averaged just 51%.

Among the four retailers, Waitrose maintained the fullest fridges and freezers on average during the audit — 70% and 54% respectively.

Popular Products Disappear First

When demand rises sharply, shoppers tend to reach for trusted favourites. That's exactly what our audit found: Magnum was absent from 47% of the stores visited (excluding stores with broken freezers), while Monster, Lucozade, Coca-Cola and Pepsi were among the drinks most commonly out of stock.

The bakery aisle told a slightly different story, with shoppers appearing to favour private-label products instead. Across the four retailers, own-label burger buns were collectively out of stock in 38% of stores, while Warburtons — the most frequently unavailable branded product — was missing in 22%.

Equipment Matters Too

High temperatures put equipment under pressure too. Across the stores visited, 24% had at least one fridge or freezer reported as not operating properly — whether iced up, out of order or switched off. Almost all of these issues involved freezers, reinforcing the pressure on frozen categories.

Equipment issues showed very little variation between retailers: all four recorded between 21% and 26% of stores with at least one fridge or freezer not operating properly, reinforcing that high temperatures present a shared operational challenge across the grocery sector.

Planned Summer Activations Deliver Stronger Availability

Roamler also audited dedicated seasonal displays, particularly those featuring summer drinks such as beer, cider, Aperol and Pimm's. Almost 6 in 10 stores had at least one dedicated summer display in place, and these displays performed noticeably better than everyday chilled fixtures — averaging a 72.6% fill level across the stores where they were present.

Among the retailers audited, Morrisons had the highest proportion of stores featuring a dedicated summer display, with 68% of its audited stores presenting at least one seasonal activation.

"Frozen products appear to be the most challenging to keep available: higher sales, more complex handling requirements and the need to maintain the cold chain all contribute to freezers emptying faster than they can be replenished during peak trading periods."— Jon Kelly, International Account Director, Roamler

Conclusion

The recurring high temperatures experienced across Europe are creating a growing challenge for retailers, as demand can increase rapidly — particularly in chilled and frozen categories, where availability depends on both effective stock management and reliable equipment.

While some retailers performed better than others across specific categories, the audit revealed a number of common patterns across the sector. Keeping shelves full during periods of extreme demand remains a shared challenge, reinforcing the importance of preparation, operational readiness and strong execution when temperatures rise.