[Closed] Tesco Six Billion Loss

Shopping should never be a leisurely and relaxed experience

The tills record how long each transaction takes anmd staf are quizzed retrained if they take to long,

*community my arse, supermarket chains are there for one reason, bottom line profits

I hate shopping full stop.
local tesco is too freaking massive with a gazillion products and stupid non offers but I can get out the checkouts with ease (tills, selfservice and mobile scanners).
local aldi is okay as products are consistently and reasonably priced, the selection is just spot and quality is perfectly fine. however, car parks is a nightmare and the checkouts always crap.

much rather do it online and use the local shops for topups

JY it seems to be you and me again on yet another thread 🙂

How do you explain the first point, pension funds are huge holders of UK shares ? They generally have to be hold FTSE index components but can vary the weighting - hence the changes you see in percentages quoted above, Tesco has been a big short/underweight in the market for a while.

Second one, see my earlier post on why the shares are up. The markets pre-judge and estimate corporate earnings announcements, they pre-position. Short term the markets aren't "infallable" - in fact the term infallable is meaningless in markets terms circumstances change and the market adjusts.

Share ownership is essentially not pensions nor "ordinary" people.

Bit if a a tangent to go off on not least when the share price went up which says a lot about the infallable and rational market.

Did anyone else get upset when Lidl changed their layout a few years back to put the bakery first rather than the heavy stuff like drinks and tins which go in the bottom of your trolley then everything else gets piled on top? I used to get round the store in a very efficient snaking motion with a single perimeter pass for chilled stuff but now I have to go backwards and forwards. Aside from that though its all good, though I have noticed things slipping at Aldi...

Still made an operating profit. Losses count the pensions shortfall and the real estate "losses". As such, they'll likely only report this once. The markets know this hence the increase in share value because come next quarter, the new CEO will announce that they're "back" in profit and be the new messiah.
I still don't like them, and rue the loss of our high street shops.
I think we'll see less superstores being built and more distribution hubs as more and more people shop online.

squirrelking showing a worrying lack of trolley layout organisational skills 😉

Which is the nastier/not as good one- Lidl or Aldi? Mrshora keeps telling me ones low(er)-rent than the other.

pipe the smell of the bakery throughout the store.

Which is the nastier/not as good one- Lidl or Aldi?

They were ignorant and we could mock .... till you spoiled it

I place on record my apologies for trampling over your subtle joke.

Which is the nastier/not as good one- Lidl or Aldi?

Is there a quality issue at either? I find the fruit and veg fine at my local Lidl and anything else I buy there too. Recently started working away from home with easiest place to get food nearby being an Aldi - seems much the same to me.

Sounds like some should avoid pa investments at least until accountancy training completed!

So Drastic Dave does the first bit, can he deliver on the hard stuff now. Personally doubt it - Tescos have been Tesco-ed!

The till system at Aldi seems like it's rushed until people realise you aren't supposed to bag your shopping at the till.

You are supposed to put it back in the trolley as its scanned, get out of the way, and then bag it at the shelf after the tills.

I'm not sure it's any faster in total, but I suppose it means the tills take up less room compared to the standard supermarket design.

the "schnell! schnell! hurry the **** up" queue for those grumps amongst us and the chatty cheery community* fun based queue for Ernie and those slow buggers who never even start to look for their purse/wallet until the last item is bagged.

I actually like Aldi, I use them more than I use Tesco. And I'm quite looking forward to the [url=

CROYDONADVERTISER.CO.UK "http://www.croydonadvertiser.co.uk/Opening-date-set-new-Aldi-budget-supermarket/story-26216907-detail/story.html]big"

new Aldi opening near me tomorrow[/url].

But I'm not going to pretend that their checkout system is vastly superior to Tesco's. Nor that Aldi eating into the Tesco's share of the market somehow represents a victory for "the small town shops". And I haven't yet seen any evidence that this also represents a great victory for suppliers.

I use them more than I use Tesco

You turncoat, have you lost your love for Tesco?

No I still love Tesco. But Aldi is cheaper. Their cat food is silly cheap. I don't know how they do it. And the cats love the taste of it.

mudshark - Member
Lidl and Aldi pay grads very well:

They do but the work them VERY hard for it (or at least they did around 10-15 years ago when I knew people doing those jobs) - they were working stupid hours on the promise of promotion but the vast majority sacked it in realising what their effective hourly rate ended up as.

I like their "no messing about" attitude to till queue management. The queues can be long but seem to move quickly as no doddering is tolerated. It helps keep costs down too.

And

Lidl and Aldi pay grads very well:

[url=

take it working practices have improved at Lidl then,. or is this "blood money"?[/url]

[url=

EN.WIKIPEDIA.ORG "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lidl#Criticism]Lidl"

Lidl - Wikipedia

Black Book....[/url]

What i dont get about Aldi/Lidl customers, why do carry boxes into the shop, spend ten minutes packing all their shopping into bags or boxes 2ft from the till they were ejected from, only to trolley over to the car and struggle to lift said box into the boot? Just flipping leave the boxes in the car and pack from the trolley direct into the car? its not raining most of the time.

You are supposed to put it back in the trolley as its scanned, get out of the way, and then bag it at the shelf after the tills.

FWIW I find the best technique is to have three or four big "bag for life" style bags already open and sat in the trolley and then you can do the the "quick fling off the belt and into the trolley" thing and your shopping's still bagged and ready for the car.

Tesco: Big write down on "book" values of fixed assets which are notional anyway, not a real, cash "loss" at all.

I agree with those saying its just an accounting trick. The new CEO can devalue as much as possible and have poor result that can be blamed on his predicessor. Then he can save the day with improving results in the future. The losses are all due to a 'revaluation' exercise designed to come up with the answer they wanted for the accounts

Common sense can be found here:

THEGUARDIAN.COM "http://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/apr/22/tesco-posts-record-loss-what-the-experts-say"

Tesco posts record loss: what the experts say | Tesco | The Guardian

Here’s what City analysts are saying after one-off writedowns helped to drive Britain’s largest supermarket into its biggest ever loss

I don't like Lidl at all. I like a nice shopping experience, with nice quality stuff and being tempted by interesting looking stuff.

I prefer Waitrose 🙂 Although it must be said Asda seems to have more local stuff, like the cheese.. mm..

You are supposed to put it back in the trolley as its scanned, get out of the way, and then bag it at the shelf after the tills. I'm not sure it's any faster in total

FWIW I find the best technique is to have three or four big "bag for life" style bags already open and sat in the trolley and then you can do the the "quick fling off the belt and into the trolley" thing and your shopping's still bagged and ready for the car.

This is where Tesco have actually got the upper hand. Scan and Shop (or whatever it's called) where you scan as you go round is [s]brilliant[/s] a good step towards making shopping marginally less painful.

Just have a few big bag for life thingies open in the trolley, pick it off the shelf, scan, bag, done. You finish your shop with everything correctly scanned and then just pay and leave. No pesky checkouts at all.

But Tesco's big issue is they stopped putting the customer first and started putting the shareholder first, hence the perception their offers are trying to trick us into spending more without offering value rather than just being good value. Their huge rise was due to them genuinely being cheaper and giving the customer what they wanted. They forgot about all of this and have become too big and bloated. They will reset, cut costs and offload assets and get back to what they were good at eventually.

Edit: This is great stat: "Aldi UK today generates twice the sales per full-time employee compared to Tesco UK and is expected to report higher trading profits"

It takes lots of people to come up with all those confusing, frustraiting deals. The dificulty for tesco is to know what to get rid of and what to keep. They can't just copy Aldi and Lidl.

The £600 million of inventory write off is also interesting. Basically the stuff the bought is now worth £600 million less than they thought it was. I.e. That big bloated organisation is not just too big but they are making crappy decisions as well.

No I still love Tesco. But Aldi is cheaper. Their cat food is silly cheap. I don't know how they do it. And the cats love the taste of it.

"Aldi UK today generates twice the sales per full-time employee compared to Tesco UK and is expected to report higher trading profits"

Of course. They do this by having less warehouse (if any.. most stock seems to be on the floor so few shelf stackers either), no coffee shop, fewer cleaners by the look of it, no helpers, hardly any checkout staff (in mine at least).

They don't do the same with less money, they do less with less money. You may be happy with less, but that's a consumer choice.

They don't do the same with less money, they do less with less money. You may be happy with less, but that's a consumer choice.

Well quite.

The point is that all that extra stuff that tesco do isn't making them any extra money.

Maybe it's because people aren't enticed to tesco because they can get a coffee, maybe it's because tesco aren't efficient at making coffee?

The situation at the Chesterfield Tesco is probably quite a good case study. There is a huge Tesco Extra, its one of those upstairs ones with the huge long conveyors to endure before you start shopping. Upstairs there is a Costa, at the back of the store up another set of stairs is a cafe. Before you see any food you have to walk past half a department stores worth of home and clothes. So to visit Tesco is a massive pain in the arse due to the size and layout but 5 years ago they were cheap and had a good range so you went, and then bought a load of other crap while you were there.

Now they aren't cheap and their instock levels are patchy, so the incentive to visit is dimished.

And now next door there is an Aldi, a Costa drive though and an Asda "supermarket" (one of the old Netto's). You any of these are all more convienent that Tesco and cheaper too. But now maybe you missed out on the clothes and TVs you wanted. The competitors have that covered too as 5 mins down the road is a one stop location for non food with a George (Asda) standalone store, a Next and a Debenhams.

So people aren't going to Tesco for food so aren't buying all the other crap they sell on top and they don't need to go to Tesco as a destination either as others do that better.

Copying the others is nearly impossible as the huge store Tesco have is a huge burden. Their only option is to become a food destination again by beating the discounters, easier said than done (see Morrisons for a case study of why that isn't a great idea).

Oh and online and click and collect is both necessary to retain customers and stop Occado nicking all the most profitable ones but also completly at odds with Tesco's requirement to get more people into their stores to buy all of the randon shit they fill their stores with.

Basically they're screwed and they should have seen it coming!

I've tried Lidl a couple of times, but their veg is shit TBH, and I want to be able to have 2-3 of an item, not a bag or net. You can never be sure they'll have what you want either. Might have, say; coconut milk for instance, but then again they might not, which means another shop another day (usually at one of the big four) where you know they'll have what you want...so you may as well go there in the first place.

Maybe it's because people aren't enticed to tesco because they can get a coffee, maybe it's because tesco aren't efficient at making coffee?

Yeah.. Waitrose is better for coffee. They give you a free one and a paper too if you spend over £10 so that's a winner to begin with.

Tescos vary a lot though. Round our way the two big ones, you come in in the middle and it's left for food, right for stuff. There's the St Mellons one though, and that's very tatty indeed, still got the red and beige colour scheme.

I've tried Lidl a couple of times, but their veg is shit TBH,

Where we live it all comes from the same fruit & veg processing company. From the same suppliers, same fields etc. The variable that stores have a little control over is shelf life, so you could save some money by having a 5 day shelf life instead of 3.

Yeah.. Waitrose is better for coffee. They give you a free one and a paper too if you spend over £10 so that's a winner to begin with.

That's just at the weekend, only a fiver spend during the week.

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But Tesco's big issue is they stopped putting the customer first and started putting the shareholder first

Very true.

Like another well known (but poorly performing) high street brand*, Tesco has become a storeroom company. That's to say, management look in the storeroom and say "What can we sell?", rather than standing outside the front of the shop and saying "Do I want to shop here?".

There's a place for no frills, and there's a place for high end. But there probably isn't any longer a place for "started with food but now try to do everything but we're not really sure why".

*WHSmith - how the hell are they still in business?

Blimey if that is putting the shareholders first, they must be REALLY bad at customer service

Share price -24% over past year and well over £4 5 years ago versus today's £2.23. Divi close to 5% and a kitchen sink Dave - might be worth a little "nibble" in the value section!

Yeah.. Waitrose is better for coffee. They give you a free one and a paper too if you spend over £10 so that's a winner to begin with.

Waitrose don't sell shoelaces ffs. What kind of crap supermarket doesn't sell shoelaces ? My local ethically owned convenience store sells shoelaces, as well as most other stuff, and it's only got a few square feet of floor space. I would be mortified if Tesco didn't sell shoelaces.

And Waitrose croissants are shite btw. At least they were about 8 years ago on the one and only occasion I bought some.

Blimey if that is putting the shareholders first, they must be REALLY bad at customer service

Share price -24% over past year and well over £4 5 years ago versus today's £2.23. Divi close to 5% and a kitchen sink Dave - might be worth a little "nibble" in the value section!

Indeed. I think it was more big egos and shit forecasting that got them into this position.

That's not even getting into the details such operating without a CFO in place for most of last year.

Maybe it's just my highly trained eyes but

molgrips - Member

the two big ones
St Mellons
you come in in the middle

Given the fact that customers provide the working finance for supermarkets and that it is a volume business, you have to be truly incompetent not to prioritise your customers.

*WHSmith - how the hell are they still in business?

Cost control

They have basically said "selling magazines, books and stationary is screwed in the long term, therefore how can we milk as much cash out of it as possible in the short term".

So they stopped investing in their stores (or anything really); started hawking massive bars of chocolate at the tills; focused on high margin travel locations such as airports, service stations etc where customers have no choice but to buy their overpriced convenience crap; stopped selling low margin items such as CDs and DVDs and did everything they could to make money without spending any. It was very successful for their chief exec who oversaw all of this, Kate Swan left in 2013 with a cool £13m! (and walked straihgt into another job).

They don't do the same with less money, they do less with less money. You may be happy with less, but that's a consumer choice.

Many people think that Aldi provide better quality produce for a given price.

I know the fake offers thing is annoying, but this:

An example, share bags of Cadbury giant buttons, in the last 6 months they have been £1 for a 165g bag, £1.50 for a 165g bag, £2 for a 165g bag but buy 2 for £3, £2 for a 109g bag, £1.50 for a 109g bag and £1 for a 109g bag, all with various yellow offer signs at random points. Frankly, it's dirty and misleading.

appears to demonstrate a not entirely healthy obsession with the price of Cadbury buttons to a level I'd not really thought possible!

Cost control

And basically a hatred of their customers.

I'd rather a business carefully managed its costs AND gave a great service to its customers. See Amazon....

I don't think Tesco have ever really competed on price even though they've often pretended to be, they've always been a mid ground supermarket price wise. This is no bad thing though, I think there is a market for a "nicer than Aldi, cheaper than Waitrose" kind of place.

Their challenge is partly a general cynicism to them from the public based on some fairly questionable pricing tactics combined with horrible stores to shop in. The former is easy to fix, stop questionable "offers", set a price that is less than Waitrose, done. The latter is also easy in principle but much harder in practise when you have spent a decade building huge stores.

Edit, and amedias, guilty as charged. I no longer go into supermarkets at lunch as that is what happens, I simply can't be trusted, if the buttons were too much I'd just by some other crap instead.

I'd rather a business carefully managed its costs AND gave a great service to its customers. See Amazon....

Generating a profit is easier when you avoid tax.