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width="1" height="1" //divpOn one side there is an ageing crooner in a cardigan and on the other an
impish TV presenter who favours wooden beads. It is Countdown vs Top Gear with Des O'Connor versus
Richard Hammond - and the man known as The Hamster is winning hands down./ppHammond and O'Connor
are going head-to-head as the Christmas TV faces of two of the UK's biggest supermarkets, and
O'Connor's Tesco is now trailing way behind Hammond's Morrisons. Tesco, the UK's biggest retailer,
yesterday revealed its worst sales figures for 14 years. Like-for-like sales - which exclude gains
from new stores - were ahead just 2% in the last three months, or half the growth achieved in the
previous quarter./ppIn an unusually gloomy quarterly trading update, Tesco's chief executive, Sir
Terry Leahy, blamed the economic downturn: "We are pleased with our progress, but we are also
realistic - the current economic climate and the strain this is putting on consumers everywhere is
something that all businesses are feeling, including ours." But not all supermarkets are as gloomy.
Bradford-based Morrisons is - so far - storming through the recession. Tomorrow it is expected to
reveal recent sales up around 7.5% on last year - maintaining much the same impressive rate of
growth as it reported three months ago./ppTesco's performance is also markedly worse than its
rivals Sainsbury and Asda. Sainsbury - which has hired "I'm a Celebrity ..." hosts Ant and Dec to
star in its adverts alongside its usual frontman Jamie Oliver - last month revealed like-for-like
sales up 3.9%. Meanwhile Asda, which is reflecting the new austerity by shunning celebrities and
filming traditional family Christmas ads in the Yorkshire Dales, grew 6.9% in the three months to
the end of September. But Morrisons is now top of the pile, pulling in thousands of new shoppers
every week, especially in the south-east, where it was almost unheard of until a couple of years
ago./ppThe Morrisons empire, built by Sir Ken Morrison, was always a fiercely Yorkshire business.
But it descended into chaos, with tumbling sales and profits after it took over its larger rival
Safeway. Shareholders demanded a management shake-up and Marc Bolland was installed as chief
executive, even though he had spent his career working for Dutch brewer Heineken and had never run
a shop. Bolland did, however, understand marketing./ppThe stores were given a new green and yellow
look and out went the outmoded "More reasons to shop at Morrisons" adverts. In their place Bolland
brought in a raft of celebrities - Denise van Outen, Lulu, Alan Hansen, Nick Hancock and, more
recently, Richard Hammond./ppThe TV adverts now concentrate on image, while press adverts go
toe-to-toe with Tesco and the others on price. One retail executive said: "It was an old-fashioned
grocer competing with the slicker marketing of rivals. The new Bolland empire has given the brand a
slick new look and feel. He has taken the brand and the business and given it a polish". It is,
however, far too soon to write off Tesco. Yesterday's poor sales figures were actually slightly
better than most City experts had predicted, and its shares rose. The grocer, which accounts for
pound;1 out of every pound;7 spent on the UK high street, decided months ago that a full-scale
recession was on its way and, in a bid to stop bargain-hunting shoppers drifting away to discount
outlets such as Aldi and Lidl, launched its own range of Discounter goods./ppIn September, some 350
new lines - from Shampoo to curry sauce and teabags - went onto Tesco's shelves. The range was the
biggest since Tesco launched its Value label in the last recession, with prices higher than Value,
but lower than the premium, proprietary brands and the grocer's standard own-label equivalents. The
supermarket rebranded itself as "Britain's biggest discounter" and the bargain range has been
expanded to 800 products. Yesterday's lower sales figures, said Tesco, are a direct result of
introducing these lower-priced goods. "We think this is the right strategy to help our business and
our customers through the tougher times ahead."/ppAccording to Tesco, the new range is pulling in
300,000 new customers a week and now accounts for 5% of everything that goes through its tills. At
the same time, sales of higher-priced organic foods and the grocer's Finest upmarket heat-and-eat
meals has gone into reverse. Aside from the impact of the discount range, the big supermarkets are
currently locked in a fierce price war. For retailers, discounting means selling more just to stand
still./ppCity analysts were yesterday divided over exactly whether Tesco was cleverly planning for
the future, or falling out of favour. Oriel Securities said it was obvious that shoppers were
switching to Tesco's lower-priced Discounter range "but in general we are seeing a waning in the
UK's love affair with the market leader"./ppBut another from broker Cazenove, said the data showed
Tesco "is back on the front foot in the UK and is ahead of its competitors in preparing for battle
fought in a deflationary world"./pdiv style="float: left; margin-right: 10px; margin-bottom:
10px;"ullia href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/tesco"Tesco/a/lilia
href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/morrisons"Morrisons/a/lilia
href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/supermarkets"Supermarkets/a/lilia
href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/advertising"Advertising/a/lilia
href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/creditcrunch"Credit crunch/a/lilia
href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/recession"Recession/a/li/ul/diva
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