John Lewis in Trouble

sorry I could rant for England on the lack of understanding on time and resource needed to install a useful and functioning IT system

That was one of the reasons I left exjob for semi retirement. I've been filing old emails and going through my inbox in 2020/2021 and reading my ranting to a mate about the whole thing, I'd forgotten just how bad our new system was. It seems to be a given that the people who actually have to make a new IT system work are the ones who dn't get any input into the tendering process or are allowed to ask the difficult questions.

Anyway, Waitrose. It looks like my local have changed their lighting to something more industrial than the usual warm welcoming lights, so that might account for the general feeling of dinginess. I thought yesterday that Lidl and Waitrose seem to have changed places - Lidl is the well lit, well stocked shop that W'rose used to be, while W'rose looks like Lidl did in the early days - hire a warehouse, stack up the boxes and never mind about a well laid out shop people want to wander around.

I thought the opposite for the post office with the various CEOs brought in without understanding the culture and under pressure to run as a business rather than as a public service.

Also fell foul of the common fallacy amongst very senior management that whizzy IT systems can solve all problems, when it’s usually the opposite in my experience. I’ve actually attended a board meeting where they were all “is shiny!” at a presentation from a software vendor, and they were rhapsodising about how it could tell you how long it would take for a document to go from draft to approved status. Got told off for being too negative when I asked if we actually need to know how long it takes and did the system actually fix the gaps that our current system has.

sorry I could rant for England on the lack of understanding on time and resource needed to install a useful and functioning IT system.

Yeah, horrible tinny stuff. It was early though so might not be a thing generally, I don't recall it at other times. I saw Greek week and as I have some donations for the Mind shop over the road, might pop in today and stock up.

However. The opposite to this phenomenon is the post office - where PO lifers got promoted beyond their capabilities and knowing the business was thought more important than outside views. So no one new was brought in at manager level and we ended up witn the catastrophe we did

I think it's part of the idea that any project manager can manage anything, even if they'd never worked in the field before.

Not enough attention is paid to this well observed problem.

It is part of the reason the NHS is in such a bloody mess.

There are now three LIDLs on my daily routes, all with big free car parks. I have to pay 2.50 to pop into the car park at Waitrose.

I won't bother, I'm too "low" for Sharon. I'm going to download the LIDL app and collect their points.

What in the actual good green earth are they doing? Do they actually want to immolate themselves publicly as a company?

I feel so sorry for the Partners who seem to have lost control of the Partnership Council and the Board.

You got music in your local Lidl @MrsDanversGlidesAgain ?
Lordy.
I was in mine today and got some delicious things (Greek week) I have never seen elsewhere in the UK.
It was clean and fairly well stocked and the staff were smiley and lovely.
My local Waitrose closed a while back, but I've got over it.

That was in May last year and there's a new CEO now.

We will see.

There was chat about it last year -

https://www.reuters.com/business/retail-consumer/uks-john-lewis-eyes-end-100-staff-ownership-times-2023-03-18/

Seems to have been reconsidered though -

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-65520696.amp

I came on here to link to this and can see someone's already beaten me to it!

www.jamesesses.com/p/the-trans-takeover-of-john-lewis

I saw it on LinkedIn and am scared to 'like it' in case I get pulled up by my employer for being anti trans.

It gave me the absolute creeps tho.

Well, as it seems to be a lottery as to whether the basics will be in any of their shops...

Don’t worry, Dame Sharon has relinquished her role as CEO , and is now ‘only ‘ the Chairman. The new CEO is a 65 year old man with an impressive CV who has however no retail experience in his long career. Oh, and they are ‘Bolstering the Board’ with a woman who worked for the National Lottery.

So that will be okay, then.

She's a copper bottomed fool who has ruined a good sustainable business which didn't actually exploit its workers or consumers

And when her stint at JL is up White will move seamlessly into some other extremely well rewarded job.

I swerved Waitrose this morning and went to Lidl and the difference was painful. Well lit, shelves stocked and not having to dodge around shelfstackers and their trollets in the aisles all the time. Shame about the canned music but you can't have everything.

Gosh I feel for the staff. Imagine having to work with all that, then the people in charge double down.

Sheer recklessness with people's livelihoods.

I didn't know they wanted to take it out of the partnership model?!

She does.

She thinks she is Michelle Obama??

Hmm, so our desire for basics without being preached to hasn’t gone down well the Sharon White and the Board. Apparently she’s on the moral high ground and we’re the lowest of the low. How very dare we ask for a shop that has products that we want without some fetishist bring their “whole self” to work…. To the Board of John Lewis - just all of you resign. I know you want to take it out of the Partnership model to refinance it for short term gain for fat cats, buts not the model that isn’t working it’s the Board. Resign

image via James Esses

Having said all that, though, I'm guilty of a toddler-like expectation that John Lewis and M&S should focus their entire sales operation around me personally because over the years, thanks to some brilliant marketing and high street social history, they've developed an almost human presence in my life, in a way that Tesco/Next/Dunelm never could or will. I know this isn't reasonable but I suppose it explains the cutted-up pear indignation I feel when JLP insists on pushing financial services and housing schemes at me, when what I WANT IS RELIABLE BASICS AND A SPOTLESS CAFE.

I don't have a John Lewis anywhere near me, which is something MN posts used to make me feel wistful about! Times were that no-one on MN seemed to have a bad word to say about it. That's definitely changed; these days mumsnet mentions of John Lewis purchases seem as likely to be dire warnings to avoid shopping there, as they are product recommendations.

On that basis, I think John Lewis is running into financial trouble.

Gosh, that's difficult to believe.

They've unequivocally misjudged the zeitgeist.

Who the fuck signed off on it? It's got death knell written all over it.

If their judgment is this bad, no wonder they're failing.

Exactly, I’m imagining with horror DS’s big bouncy adolescent Labrador galloping round JL slipping and sliding on the floor and cocking his leg up on the rails of expensive jackets before deciding he needs a shit now and doing one of his ginormous steaming dumps on the floor.

The thought is horrific.

What are they thinking, and that’s even before looking at the horrors of their celebrated diverse staff in fetish gear.

It’s got to be a joke right, who the fuck makes these decisions?

I know Waitrose has always been at the pricier end, but I went in for the first time in ages recently and almost laughed out loud at the prices -£5.50 for a sandwich, £6 for a couple of chicken Kievs.

Then their self checkout machine didn't work properly and they were out of stock of the thing I'd especially gone in for.

A joint of meat I'd bought was off. I complained online and after four back and forward emails, they finally refunded me via gift card the exact amount I'd paid. No compensation for the waste of energy / time spent cooking and sorting the issue out. And didn't even refund the card I'd paid on. Poor all round.