Retail therapy OBSERVER
Financial Times – 23 January 2003
Britain: a nation of shopkeepers? Tesco's entry yesterday into the battle for the Safeway supermarket group brought further sales-season joy to the City of London's underemployed army of investment bankers, lawyers and public relations consultants.
Now anyone who is (or was) anyone in retailing is advising someone - although some are vague about just whom.
They include Lord MacLaurin, erstwhile Tesco chairman, and a former duo from Asda (owned by mighty Wal-Mart) - Allan Leighton, now boss of the Royal Mail, and Archie Norman, an opposition Conservative member of parliament.
But what about Luc Vandevelde, the Belgian who saved Marks and Spencer and its famous underwear? He has just become M&S's non-executive chairman to spend time at Change Capital Partners, a private equity fund backed by the Halley family (who made their money selling Promode s to Carrefour in 1999). Word is that it is too early for Vandevelde to be distracted from Change - and it's all quiet on the Y-front.
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