The City is still not convinced Sainsbury's long-term strategy will deliver, despite it reporting its best performance in over a decade after a year of restructuring. One analyst said: "The numbers were slightly ahead of expectations, but the outlook is not as positive as it should be given the benign trading environment." Another commented: "Sir Peter's three-year reinvigoration programme seems to be slipping into four years, with completion dates on the distribution network and store reformatting slipping to 2004-5. And he was very vague on when Sainsbury will be able to achieve margins that compare with Tesco." Kate Calvert from Investec Securities said: "Sainsbury has done the easy bit, but now is has to start convincing customers outside its heartland they should be shopping at Sainsbury. It has got to bring family shoppers back if it is to compete with Asda and Tesco." Analysts were also unconvinced by plans for a chain of Savacentres. One said: "Savacentre has never worked in the past because Sainsbury was no good on non-food as it did not have the skills or the critical mass. "The jury is still out on whether they have the skills now. They certainly don't have the critical mass." Expanding the Jeff and Co range with lower priced products did not impress analysts either. One said: "This is a change of strategy because it has, so far, been a mid-value range. But from the shape of the market it was obvious they needed lower entry price points from the start." {{NEWS }}

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