Tesco Extra Loughborough: store of the week interview

How have customers reacted to the new year price cuts? Customers always like it when there’s a bargain to be had. 

Have you put much in-store marketing behind the cuts? Not a lot. These days customers know the prices so well you don’t have to market it much. 

How has availability been over Christmas and the new year? We’ve had a major investment in manpower in the last few months, about 40 new people. It’s meant a lot more colleagues in store, especially in the evenings. Customers can find people now to help them and it’s made a really big difference.

The store had a major revamp in September. Did you change the layout much? No, not much. We tried to keep it as the old Extra layout because our research showed customers were happy with it. The company really listened to us on that. What do customers think of the new features? The changes to F&F has really energised the department. People think it’s an entirely new range but it’s not, it’s just much better displayed. In non-food, we’ve taken out some things that didn’t add value.

Loughborough is famous for fitness. What do your customers make of the obesity crisis? Customers are looking at levels of sugar, fats and salt much more closely. We have a Nutricentre in store and it’s getting a lot of repeat customers.

Did you watch the Panorama investigation on Tesco and has it hit morale? I watched a bit of it but Corrie was on the other side so I turned over. All I can say is the company has kept staff informed about what is happening and been transparent with us. People have a lot of confidence in Dave Lewis.

You have been a Tesco manager for 18 years. How have opportunities for women changed? When I first started as a store manager it was very unusual. I was about one of half a dozen women store managers in Tesco. Things have moved on a lot.