A bone to pick

Ihope you caught Pick n Pay chairman Gareth Ackerman’s interview with CNN. It had all the bits that make for good TV: nostalgia and a scathing attack on the administration. I won’t ruin it for you (it can be streamed), but he went into the retailer’s history and where its focus will be in future.

If, like me, you are any type of nerd, you’ll appreciate that the shots are interspersed with dated Pick n Pay store pictures — some from before “the great rebranding exercise” of 2007.

Do you remember it? It was supposed to signal the deeper underlying transformation and revitalisation the grocer was undergoing. But one can’t ignore the popular opinion that the makeover — which cost north of R100m — was really where the group began losing its way, and that the money would have been better spent on centralised distribution.

I may have previously explained what centralised distribution is, but in case you missed it, and as a kindness, here we go: “stuff” gets to stores from a central warehouse rather than by the archaic system of suppliers delivering directly to the store. The easy wins are cost reduction, and time and transport efficiency.

Anyway, a decade later, the group seems to be doing the right things under ex-tesco boss Richard Brasher.

But back to Ackerman (the son of Pick n Pay founder Raymond, but you already knew that . . .): he had some choice words about government in the CNN interview, ranging from the state being paralysed by corruption to empowerment not working.

More telling, though, were his comments about the lack of communication between government and business. They reinforced a remark from the CEO of another listed retailer, who weeks ago told me that “absolutely nothing” had come of meetings between business leaders and government that were initiated last February.

These were aimed at boosting economic growth and staving off a downgrade to our sovereign credit rating. Business had outlined its concerns about the economy, and working groups were created to outline potential measures to rectify them.

If I remember correctly, the first high-level meeting took place in a packed Nedbank boardroom and Pravin Gordhan was still the country’s finance minister. How things have changed — yet stayed much the same.

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Not pulling punches

Ackerman, when asked if he expects to see some improvement once the ANC conference is out of the way next year, said this: “I think you have to be in a position where government and business can actually talk to each other. I get the view at the moment that business and government are totally isolated from each other, there are certain discussions that happen at a department level . . . but in terms of policy formation I don’t think that is happening adequately.

“I think the political fallout or the economic fallout from all these corruption allegations that are going on is causing huge polarisation between business and government . . . I think that business got involved in trying to improve or stop the downgrade from happening, government turned around and kicked sand in business’s face, and I think business is feeling disgruntled about it. There needs to be trust on both [sides] and I don’t think there is sufficient trust . . . to actually step forward.

“Post-december I hope a new attitude will come out of the ANC.”

I’ve edited it for brevity. But you get the point.