FORTNUM & MASON, grocer to the Queen, is to offer lessons in modern etiquette to aspiring young Britons, under plans to modernise the company before its tercentenary.

The store, which celebrates its 300th birthday in 2007, is also adding a wine bar and an ice-cream parlour to its three in-house restaurants.

It plans to refurbish its existing restaurants — the Fountain, which will become a brasserie, and the Patio, which will stock products from the food hall.

It is also redesigning its St James’s Restaurant on the fourth floor, which will retain its focus on serving afternoon tea.

Other developments in the £24 million revamp, which will be fully funded by the retailer’s owners, the Weston family, include plans to double the size of the food hall as it increases its offering of fresh foods and put a central atrium in the building.

However, the retailer, which is situated on Piccadilly, Central London, does not plan to extend its current trading space of 65,000 sq ft.

Fortnum & Mason, a long-time fixture on the London tourist circuit, is hoping to build on its core British customer base by improving its “something for tonight” offer of fresh hams, cheeses and fish.

As part of its modernisation drive, the retailer has cut antiques and hats from its product offering, as well as its men’s and women’s wear ranges and hairdressing services.

Instead, it will focus on the restyling itself as a supplier of premium products along the themes of food, drink, celebration and entertainment.

Along with lessons on modern etiquette, it will hold cookery demonstrations and classes on food and wine.

Beverley Aspinall, the managing director, who oversaw the regeneration of the Peter Jones store on Sloane Square, said that although she expected like-for-like sales at the shop to slide by 15 per cent in the 20-month period of restoration, which begins in March next year, sales in the year to 2008 were expected to rise 18 per cent. Ms Aspinall said that after 2008, she was expecting to see a “fairly steady uplift in sales”. She added that the work was scheduled to start after the Christmas period, when Fortnum & Mason traditionally earns about 40 per cent of its revenues.

The announcement came as the company said that in current trading sales were down 3 per cent, excluding its discontinued operations such as the menswear and womens’ wear ranges.

Ms Aspinall revealed that sales were down 13 per cent week-on-week as the tough market conditions seen across the sector took their toll of the upmarket department store.

However, she said that sales from its newly launched website, together with sales from its mail order division, were up 30 per cent on last year, with the retailer aiming for the division to bring in a third of all sales by the end of the year.

Fortnum & Mason, which recently opened its third store in Japan, will sell its products in a department store in Moscow this Christmas, marking the company’s debut appearance in Russia.

The retailer was founded in 1707, when William Fortnum took a room in the house of Hugh Mason, a shopkeeper, and the two went into business together. Floated on the London Stock Exchange in 1939, the fine foods retailer was taken private in 2001 by the British branch of the Weston family, who already controlled 90 per cent of the equity.

Restaurant expansion to prompt family war

THE revamp of Fortnum & Mason pits the Piccadilly retailer against Selfridges, the department store group up the road on Oxford Street, which recently underwent a makeover of its own.

Where Fortnums is traditionally renowned for fine foods, such as cheeses, souvenir pots of pickles and jams that appeal to tourists and wealthy traditionalists, Selfridges attracts a wider range of customers with its design-led clothing and home ranges and its nine modern restaurants and bars.

Now, as Fortnums is set to open more restaurants, the department stores will find themselves fighting over the same familial turf. Both these English retailers are owned by different branches of the Weston family.

The British arm of the family, which is headed by Guy, owns Fortnum & Mason and Heal’s. George, Guy’s brother, works at Associated British Foods.

On the other side of the Atlantic, Guy’s uncle, Galen, the Canadian billionaire, controls Selfridges, as well as Canada’s Loblaw and Ireland’s Brown Thomas.