It was last year when a food buyer at Asda’s headquarters in Leeds, northern England, hatched a plan to offer customers a £1 ($1.46) frozen pizza. With prices typically about £1.49, the price cut was a drastic one, but it did find a supplier who thought it was possible.

Northern Foods, the food producer, struck a deal with the British arm of US retailer Wal-Mart to slash the price of one of its pizzas lines in return for two things: first, the promise of a spike in sales volumes to help offset the cut in prices and second, an agreement from the retailer to keep the product simple.