<p style="text-indent:0px; line-height:12px;"><span style="font-weight:bold;">El Segundo, CA-</span><hr class="legacyRuler"><hr class="legacyRuler"><hr class="invisible minimal-padding">By Sarah Hoxie<hr class="legacyRuler"><hr class="legacyRuler"><hr class="invisible minimal-padding">12.14.12</p><hr class="legacyRuler"><hr class="invisible minimal-padding"><p>Just last week, Tesco Chief Executive Philip Clarke told investors "It's likely, but not certain, that our presence in America will come to an end.” Tesco, a UK based multinational, is one of the world's largest grocery retailers and now it could soon be selling its Fresh & Easy Market chain. I spoke to Retail Maven, Dick Spezzano, to find his perspective on what led to Fresh & Easy’s lack of success.<hr class="legacyRuler"><hr class="legacyRuler"><hr class="invisible minimal-padding">Mr. Spezzano tells us that the retailer came into California, then Arizona and Nevada and conducted studies on consumers and made changes after changes that were not well received. Californians thought that the concept didn't have a lot of pizzazz and an overwhelming majority of the skus were private label. He notes that a retailer can do this if you are an established chain in the area but because they were new to the marketplace its private label was not well received and didn't give the customers choices. The 100% self-checkout worked against Fresh & Easy as well along with fact that it didn't take American Express or coupons.<hr class="legacyRuler"><hr class="legacyRuler"><hr class="invisible minimal-padding">Additionally the produce was near 100% packaged. The only things that were not packaged were melons, bananas and pineapples. The company also said that it could merchandise down to the individual demographics of the store and Mr. Spezzano notes that they offered no differentiation in terms of produce. Fresh & Easy has a very poor meat reputation as well. When you look at meat and produce, which typically drives a store in image and sales, and the company cannot deliver, it will face an uphill battle.<hr class="legacyRuler"><hr class="legacyRuler"><hr class="invisible minimal-padding">We’ll continue to follow the Tesco saga and stay tuned for next week when Dick Spezzano discusses Supervalu. </p><hr class="legacyRuler"><hr class="invisible minimal-padding">
