Don Pumsey is away. This week’s guest column has kindly been penned by Sir Eltel Leahy, CEO of Tesgo


If the customer could choose, there’d be a Tesgo on every street corner. The repeated slurs on our good name by the Competition Commission and the OFT have done nothing to alter the precious bond we share with our customers.

I’ve been at Tesgo for three decades, and people sometimes forget I was brought up in Liverpool, a proud city with an undeserved reputation for kleptomania and collective emotional incontinence. True to my roots I return home often, but it’s been months – months! – since I was mugged there.

Indeed it’s in Liverpool that the real gratitude of the Tesgo customer comes shining through. Particularly the Everton fans. This has nothing whatsoever to do with being a bluenose myself, however. The decision to square away a few councillors was all about ensuring the people of Liverpool enjoyed state-of-the-art grocery facilities and had nothing to do with the completely new training ground and stadium. The deal is no different, in fact, from the 3-for-1 deals we are generously funding at the moment at Tesgo.

Of course, there were the predictable moaners and nimbys who didn’t look on losing their homes as an exciting opportunity to move to a purpose-built housing complex (complete with state-of-the art grocery shopping facilities) in Toxteth.

And others asked why we should be moving Goodison to such surroundings when Tesgo’s own beloved headquarters in the leafy suburb of Cheshunt look like a Georgian military base after a courtesy call from the Russian Air Force.

But I just say this. We Scousers know how to look out for each other and there’s a little social club in Everton called the County Road Cutters who owe me a favour or two. Catch my drift, Wack?