Asda CEO Andy Clarke is expecting the retailer’s customer service levels to improve in the next few months, after its stores delivered five of the 10 poorest scores over the past year in The Grocer 33 weekly service and availability mystery shopping surveys.
Asda’s store in Wallington, Croydon delivered the lowest score ever in March, with just 22 out of 100, while its Gloucester store only racked up 37 points in December.
Another London outlet, in Leyton Mills, scored 40 out of 100 in February and in the same month its Walton superstore went just one better with a score of 41.
As recently as 5 June Asda’s Southwark store notched just 42, and although Asda stores also delivered four of the 10 best scores of the past year, its most recent entry on this list was back in the middle of January when its store in Dundee West scored 89 out of 100.
Clarke, who was guest editor of The Grocer this week, said he would now be expecting to see the fruits of a £21m investment in staff hours, which was first announced last October, coming through.
“A number of players in this market have invested back into service and hours in shops, and we’ve made a conscious choice to do the same.
“It has already started to kick in. We have a history of running good shops but the halo has slipped a bit and we’re back to realign it,” he explained.
“We have changed the processes in some areas that adversely affected the customer experience and put money back in. In the second half of this year if experience doesn’t improve then that is about individual store issues rather than how we’re managing it corporately.”
Clarke insisted that the retailer’s in-store management restructure, which concluded a year ago and resulted in 1,360 redundancies, had been a success.
“All the big grocers have now gone through restructuring, and I’m certain there is more to come. But ours is working and the new structure is effective,” he said.
“I meet bi-monthly with national Colleague Voice and they share everything, warts and all, and it is of huge value to us. There have been changes when they have suggested a different structure in certain departments and we have reviewed it and made changes; in other areas we have kept it the same.”
Many of Asda’s rivals have since gone through similar processes. “It will be interesting viewing competition and how changes they have made will affect their business over the next 12 months,” he added.
No comments yet