Dixons Retail, buffeted by the dire state of the consumer electronics industry, has arguably fared far better than most of its rivals. One of its key successes over the last year has been a definite shift upmarket, after it analysed its shopping data. It realised it was "fighting for the middle market" in an attempt to persuade hard-pressed shoppers to part with their cash, selling too many Amstrad products and £300 laptops and missing out on the "design driven" customers, many of whom had kept their jobs and were on tracker-rate mortgages so had benefited from the financial crisis.