Store of the week: Tesco Portsmouth Extra

Several Tesco Extra stores have been mothballed or shrunk recently. How is yours faring? As far as I’m concerned I could do with more space. We’re the premier store in the area, we’re very busy and our like-for-likes are performing very strongly.

What changes have you made in store recently? We’ve just had self-scanners installed and have increased the number of self-service tills from six to 10. The customers absolutely love it.

Is your store going to be refreshed? That’s on hold at the moment because of the financial situation. We just need to focus on what we can influence and the things that are under our control like good service.

Have you been visited by any HQ staff yet as part of Dave Lewis’s Feet on the Floor initiative? It starts here this week and I hope it turns into a good collaboration between staff and head office. I think there’s always been that intention but this feels like a more solid plan.

How has the new CEO impressed you? He came across extremely well when he addressed all store managers and I think he really understands it’s about the staff and the customer.

One magazine said in August that there was a “void in class” between your store and the flagship Tesco Extra in Watford. Is that fair? I didn’t read it but Watford had about six or seven million spent on it and I guess we would have been equally affected by that sort of money. We must be doing something right though because in the same week we won this award the store got its highest internal customer satisfaction score too.

You’ve been a Tesco manager for seven years. What is changing the most? Dotcom is where we are growing the most, we’ve seen exponential growth and we now have a 19-van operation for online delivery, five more than we had two years ago. We’re already getting ready for the Christmas rush.