Tesco UK SQUARE

Tesco, the UK’s largest food retailer and the world’s third largest in terms of sales, has over the years attracted a reputation for being especially cut-throat whenever it feels compelled to put right what it perceives to be wrong within its business. Even if we believe just a handful of the stories which occasionally emerge from its head office in Cheshunt, there is apparently no room whatsoever for emotion when the company feels it needs to change course – only tough decisions delivered with a cold, clinical edge.

So what’s troubling Tesco this time? In its domestic market, the problem seems to be that the clinical determination underpinning its multibillion-pound business has spilled over into its contact with shoppers, meaning stores are spartan not sparkling, customer service remains aloof instead of alert and, crucially, it cannot inspire customers with what has turned out to be an ill-conceived discount-style promotion in the form of its Big Price Drop. Not so much fresh and easy as stale and downright hard.

Tesco’s widely reported financial woes in the UK have been caused, according to most commentators, by complacency. What the company certainly lacks is a demonstrable flair for the fine art of grocery – the very thing that has made British retailers the envy of others around the world. Posting its first fall in UK net profit for more than 20 years in mid-April, group chief executive Philip Clarke admitted there was a need to “put the heart and soul back in Tesco” and outlined plans to spend £1bn (€1.2bn) revitalising its fresh food offer, customer service and in-store standards.

Some serious changes are on the cards, funded largely by putting the brakes on its store expansion programme. Already, the look of its stores is changing, but it remains to be seen if adding timber panelling and more eye-catching graphics will reassure shoppers enough to reverse a small but significant decline in market share noted by analyst Kantar Worldpanel over the past year. As its newly reconfigured Everyday Value range begins to appear on the shelves, Tesco’s biggest challenge will be to win back customers’ affections. To that end, a little warmth across the whole company would certainly not go amiss.