Pauline Herbst catches up with Steve Anderson, the new MD of Foodstuffs.

What prompted the Four Square rebrand?
A few years ago, Four Square didn’t have a niche. We wanted to get away from the traditional old style of retail, get rid of the old doors that go ‘ding’ and replace them with the doors that go ‘swish’. We wanted to put supermarket techniques into the Four Square format and bring supermarketing to the rural shopping experience.
For the last two years Four Square has grown extremely well. People have been reinvesting in the stores and as a result the quality of the operators has increased as well.

Why do you think this was so successful?
There was reinvestment in terms of doing the stores up and reinvigorating the owner operators as it is a huge competitive advantage for all of them. The key advantage we have is their skin in the game and their local community. They can change their offer depending on what the local community needs but Foodstuffs has to enable them to make those changes, there has to be flexibility. One universal truth is that the consumer in Wintern is definitely not the same as the consumer in Australia or Auckland. Having the ability to cater to the local community, with skin in the game, is very important.

How has Henry’s coped in 2009?
Henry’s has gone from no stores three years ago to 17. It came out of a perception that traditionally liquor outlets were the last male bastion; sticky carpets, and a Steinlager with Sean the captain (I’m exaggerating for effect).
We thought if we could bring in some of our retail standards then we would be able to really have an impact in that market and it’s worked out that way. Henry’s is cleaner, brighter and effectively designed to attract a broader clientele, including more women, without disenchanting the traditional liquor buyers.
We’ve grown in store numbers and we are also getting significant same store growth. That’s customers voting with their feet. Now that Foodstuffs owns Liquorland we are looking at both of the brands continuing on and hopefully in time Henry’s will be a national brand.

What do you foresee impacting the supermarket industry over the next five years?
Challenges around marketing and getting to customers; with Tivos and My Skys and some challenges that the print media have, it’s harder to get to people, so direct marketing and CRM type areas are areas we definitely want to look at as well as networking and consumer power. Consumers have far more power over what they see and listen to. That’s going to be a major challenge for us in the next few years.
Sustainability is sometimes seen as a bit of a catchphrase but our focus has been on trying to reduce costs which happen to be consistent with sustainable goals, an example is our recent Lincoln New World development. A lot of R&D work went into looking at windmills, systems, natural light and paring back some of the construction costs such as tiling on the floor and ceiling tiles.
Another one is societal – health and wellbeing. Associated with that are a whole range of issues, the most important for us is the obesity epidemic. We need to have strategies, such as netball sponsorship right down to the grassroots; Eat Wise and Exercise; and Food for Thought.
That ties in with a supermarket visit from three nutritionists and a school class, who go to a partnered supermarket to purchase healthy foods and prepare a shared lunch.
Competition is good because it keeps us on our toes.

What are some of the challenges you are most looking forward to in your new role as Foodstuffs MD?
I think having a broader focus on the business and providing greater governmental and regulatory input. This is a role co-ordinating national activities and enabling local companies to look after their local community.
We want to maximise national initiatives where they make sense and maximise local initiatives where they make sense. It’s going to be a real challenge for me but I’m really looking forward to it.

You’re going to be juggling several high profile and demanding roles – what are your top three tips for people on the path to senior management?
I always push things, I’ve got four:
Treat people well. It’s really simple; think about the dignity of the people you are working with. Treat others as you wish to be treated. An early manager I had didn’t treat people well and I learnt a great deal from that. Dignity is a key thing, there are times when hard calls have to be made. In my experience, thinking of a way that allows the other person to have a dignified way out pays for itself in spades.
Respect has to be reciprocated even in tougher times. If you have a person who is not performing well, the right thing to do is to deal with it. A lot of managers avoid addressing the issue early. Avoiding it is not treating them well.
Shut up and listen. I’ve seen a lot of managers who talk far too much and that tends to de-motivate people underneath them.
Understand your customers. I spend quite a lot of time in stores, just watching consumers go about their daily activities. When I was in Mainland I used to watch a lot of people buying milk and think about what’s going through their heads when they’re doing it. Watching people and their behaviour and picking up a product in a supermarket is very important in addition to traditional market research and listening to retailers, who are seeing it all the time.
Ask why, and ask it a lot. In everybody’s career there are key people who influence you early on. Peter McKenna, founder of Mainland Products was an absolute visionary. As a young executive standing in front of him he used to ask why all the time but he did it in a very nice and supportive way. I ask why a lot.