New Woolworths boss Claire Peters vows to keep lowering prices

THE new head of Woolies, the country’s first female supermarket boss, started her career as a checkout chick at the age of 16.

THE new managing director of Woolworths has vowed big changes are coming to Australia’s biggest supermarket.

Claire Peters, a mother of two who started her career at the age of 16 working as a checkout chick at UK supermarket Tesco, told A Current Affair on Wednesday she would focus on lowering prices while improving service and private label.

“In some way or form I’ve grown up in supermarkets,” said Ms Peters, who has kept a low profile since starting in the role four months ago. “If we put the customer first, they’ll tend to put us first. Price will play a huge part.”

Ms Peters said she had lowered the price on more than 300 products since starting in June. “It’s on our Essential lines, so actually having more products on price-dropped which will help as many families as we can will be what our strategy is,” she said.

Woolworths is increasingly discounting its health products, including the Macro brand, which Ms Peters said was introduced “very much on the back” of customers asking the supermarket to help them make affordable health choices.

“Being able to afford a range of products at prices with an experience when they enter our stores is absolutely the focus for Woolworths,” she said. “Our customers told us a year ago that we weren’t good enough at some of that, so now this year and next year we want to excel.”

Woolworths continues to dominate with a 36.8 per cent share of Australia’s $100 billion supermarket sector, according to market research firm IBISWorld, with Coles on 30.9 per cent, Aldi now on 8.6 per cent and IGA and Foodland supplier Metcash falling further behind on 7.5 per cent.

Last month, Woolworths reported a 4.9 per cent lift in first-quarter food sales at its Australian supermarkets to $9.63 billion, outpacing growth at Coles.

Woolworths said the growth was achieved despite increased deflation in fruit and vegetables. The previous week, Coles cited the same deflationary pressures when it reported sales growth of just 0.4 per cent in the first quarter.

[e-mail]