A Tesco logo is pictured at a supermarket in west London on April 22, 2015. Britain's biggest retailer, supermarket group Tesco, announced Wednesday that it had plunged massively into the red last year as it took a hit on the value of its property. AFP PHOTO / ADRIAN DENNIS (Photo credit should read ADRIAN DENNIS/AFP/Getty Images)
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Every now and again, Tesco appear in headlines for all the right reasons.
Their ingenious Twitter take-downs and brilliant humanitarian gestures are winning the hearts of shoppers everywhere, and it's not hard to see why...
1. That time the manager of the Cardiff store sent a care package to a woman who was going through chemotherapy
2. When they released a line of Valentine's Day e-cards
Tesco can't shrug off its poor performance(01 of06)
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Clarke blamed the dip in sales on cutting prices, moving away from vouchers and the disruption from refurbishing a large number of stores.However, Bernstein Research's Bruno Monteyne estimates that if you took out such costs, their like-for-like sales would still have dipped by 2%.
Tesco is trying too hard to appeal to everyone (02 of06)
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Discount retailers like Asda specialise in offering good deals, while fancy supermarkets like Waitrose are without equal at providing luxury. So Tesco is trying to be a mix of everything, other customers are lured away by more specialised rivals.
Others are doing what Tesco is trying, but better(03 of06)
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Tesco "has been increasing prices way too fast over the last few years to keep up earnings growth," Monteyne points out.As a result, compared to discount retailers like Asda, Tesco is at least 4% more expensive for shoppers.
1 million fewer customers are visiting a week(04 of06)
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The proof that Tesco is having some issues comes in the footfall, as the chain seems to have lost more than 1 million customer visits a week, worth £25 million in sales.
Tesco has never done this badly (05 of06)
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Clarke, who has worked for 40 years at Tesco, admitted: “I have never seen a quarter’s like-for-like sales like this before, that I can remember."Monteyne told Radio 5 Live the results were "the worst in their history."
Even Tesco's boss isn't confident (06 of06)
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“I see every day the improvements that are coming in the business, but I’m not making any promises about sales improving in the next few quarters," Clarke warned today. Meanwhile, other analysts like Julie Palmer at Begbies Traynor think Clarke "doesn't seem to have a clear turnaround strategy". He'll have to work hard to prove them wrong.