Former Woolies boss Roger Corbett says Dan Murphy’s has ‘lost its mojo’ and has ‘bewildering’ pricing

Retail veteran Roger Corbett says Dan Murphy’s has ‘lost its mojo’ and has ‘bewildering’ pricing as he backs Bill Wavish in the civil war that has engulfed Endeavour Group.

Former Woolworths boss Roger Corbett has attacked Endeavour Group for its management of Dan Murphy’s.

Retail veteran Roger Corbett has attacked Endeavour Group for ruining the Dan Murphy’s model, which he says has “lost its mojo” by abandoning a winning ‘everyday low pricing’ strategy to instead offer a “bewildering” pricing policy.

The former Woolworths boss also savaged Endeavour, which owns 1,700 Dan Murphy’s and BWS stores as well as more than 350 pubs, and said he couldn’t understand what Dan Murphy’s prices were, and labelled Endeavour’s claims about the success of its loyalty program as “baloney”.

In a withering attack on the Endeavour board and management, Mr Corbett questioned why – in his belief – Dan Murphy’s was losing market share and facing slowing sales growth.

“They are losing market share because they’ve lost their mojo,” Mr Corbett told The Australian on Wednesday.

“It is terribly confused. You walk into a Dan Murphy’s store and in the days of (former boss) Tony Leon there was a precise, clear offer. You walk into a Dan Murphy’s store today, and they have just completely lost their mojo. It is bewildering, I wouldn’t know what their pricing policy was,” Mr Corbett said.

The former Woolworths boss, who bought Dan Murphy’s and helped build it into a massive profit driver for Woolworths, said a chain such as Dan Murphy’s was a “category killer” and must have a clear pricing policy to back that.

“One of the reasons we bought Dan Murphy’s for was that it was a wonderful example of a category killer that was also an everyday low price retailer … and it was a great investment for Woolworths and made Woolworths Rinvestors a lot of money.

“Dan Murphy’s has now clearly lost its way. The everyday low pricing formula is in my view the most powerful retail formula in the world if you can get yourself into it. It took Walmart in the US to being the biggest retailer in the world, it took Woolworths from a share price of $2.43 to a share price of $30, and it hasn’t moved since.”

Mr Corbett, who is a shareholder in Endeavour and says like many he has lost money as the share price has sunk, has weighed into the civil war that has now erupted within the Endeavour boardroom and broken out into full public view, backing the candidacy of his former Woolworths colleague Bill Wavish to the board.

Mr Wavish was finance director when Woolworths, under Mr Corbett, bought Dan Murphy’s in 1998, and together they oversaw its huge growth from only six stores in Victoria to a national liquor retail champion with hundreds of stores across Australia.

Now Mr Wavish is seeking to be elected to the Endeavour board to offer, what he believes, is guidance and advice on how to improve the liquor retail side of the business, but his efforts could be stymied by sections of the Endeavour board who won’t allow him to be a candidate for election unless he first gains regulatory and probity approvals.

Mr Corbett said if at the AGM shareholders couldn’t nominate and vote on a person becoming a director it would make corporate democracy a “nonsense”.

But a schism has now opened up within the Endeavour boardroom, with Bruce Mathieson Junior – whose family owns 15 per cent of the company and its biggest shareholder – publicly clashing with the board to support Mr Wavish’s candidacy.

Mr Corbett said arguments from Endeavour’s management about the power of its Dan Murphy’s loyalty program – which has 5.2m active members – was “baloney”.

“Loyalty programs are no alternative to running a really good business. People don’t come to you because of loyalty programs, they come to you because you have the best possible merchandise at the best possible prices.”

He said if the loyalty program was so successful, why were Dan Murphy’s same-store sales so poor and why were they losing market share.

Mr Corbett added that Mr Wavish had a fabulous mix of finance and retail skills. He said Mr Wavish could be voted on and if elected could sit as a “director elect” until he received regulatory and probity approval.

Originally published as Former Woolies boss Roger Corbett says Dan Murphy’s has ‘lost its mojo’ and has ‘bewildering’ pricing