Yahoo Finance Woolworths to spend $65 million to makes stores more appealing
Woolworths will spend $65 million over the next year to upgrade its stores in an effort to provide better customer satisfaction.
The retailer will remove gates from the front of its stores, repair shopping trolleys, improve lighting, fix holes and replace rusty shelves.
The spending spree is in response to negative customer feedback around poor service and complaints about a lack of product availability.
"What we're after is having a great store every day for our customers," Woolworths director of supermarkets Dave Chambers told Fairfax Media.
"We need to have stores in the right place, we need to have a great network looking forward, we have to have the right price and we have to have a great experience for the customer," he said.
Chambers, who moved from New Zealand to take the helm earlier this year, said he was appalled at the state of Woolworths outlets.
It is proving to be a challenging time for Woolworths as it struggles to compete with Coles and German newcomer Aldi.
Also read: Woolworths chairman to leave, profit slides
In June, the supermarket giant announced 1200 jobs would be cut and its CEO Grant O’Brien stepped down after disappointing sales.
Nevertheless, Chambers remains upbeat.
“We're still number one but to make sure we resonate as number one in customers' minds is really exciting," he told Fairfax.
