Amid all the continued shenanigans with horse meat and the industry taking another beating from doctors over obesity, Morrisons managed to deliver some much-needed cheer yesterday with the acquisition of 49 former Blockbuster Video stores.

The start of 2013 has been littered with retail failures - alongside Blockbuster there has been Jessops, Republic and HMV. So the news that Morrisons intends resurrect 56 of these stores - including the seven Jessops it snapped up a fortnight ago - with the creation of more than 1,000 jobs is certainly not to be sniffed at.

Morrisons’ share price also enjoyed a rare recent rally yesterday - boosted by both the Blockbuster news and a general feeling that it is in a better position than most of its rivals to see a benefit from the horse meat scandal.

Its recent TV ads featuring those loveable Geordie rogues Ant and Dec, which focus on Morrisons’ sourcing and in-store craft skills, seemed particularly well-timed, given its vertical integration model.

The convenience store news is certainly positive and should provide a much-needed injection of pace into the rollout of its small store format stores. Whether it is fast enough is another matter. Many of its rivals cited convenience as a key sales driver over the Christmas period and while M-Local (now set to be re-badged as Morrisons M local) stores have attracted plenty of praise for the offer - the fact remains that it has only opened seven in more than a year and a half.

Morrisons has previously stated that it plans to have 70 c-stores open by the end of this year, and these acquisitions will certainly help it reach that target. But with a long way to go until the end of the year, perhaps there is an opportunity to go beyond that initial target and really make its presence felt in convenience.

If Morrisons can translate the store standards and strength of offer from these first c-stores into a full-scale chain then it could really have something worth shouting about. Of course, this is what we were saying in June 2011.

As with online, Morrisons really needs to get moving in convenience if it wants to complete its gold run.

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