WAY back in the depths of time, when food and sex had rarely intertwined and Nigella Lawson had yet to lick a finger, there was Justin King.
Then a young man — we are talking 16 years ago — he had just left Pepsi for a plum job launching a Belgian ice-cream brand for Grand Metropolitan. As ever, he had ideas.
“We sat around with the ad agency, and they had two lines of thought. One was about luxury and had shots of Gaudi architecture and stuff, or, they said, they could do this bit of fun about ice cream and sex. I said, Yeaah.”
And Häagen Dazs launched a whole new line in gastroporn marketing — currently being churned out by Marks & Spencer Food (which King, funnily enough, went on to manage) and countless others.
And where is the self- confessed “gobby young shite” today? No less than boss of JSainsbury and looking pretty pleased with himself, too, after the supermarket chain announced its best quarterly sales-growth figures for four years. Ice cream is leading the way, no doubt.
“We always said that the first thing we had to do was restore sales growth,” says King, stretching back in his third-floor office overlooking London’s Holborn Circus.
“It is the purest level of customer satisfaction; 16m people voting with their wallet every week — that’s more votes than the current government gets every five years.”
He gives another cheeky-chappie grin. Short and plumply sleek, like one of those bowling pins that will never roll over, the charismatic King has been chief executive at Sainsbury since early 2004. Still only 45, with his slicked-back hair and warmly articulate style, he seems already to have imbued the supermarket chain with some of his own effervescence.
Last week’s figures mean that for the second quarter running Sainsbury’s like-for-like sales growth has been higher than Tesco’s. City analysts want to see real profits before they break out the bunting, but it looks like Sainsbury’s slide could be over.
“The next thing we have to do is maintain a good level of sales momentum while at the same time managing costs very tightly. Then the margin gets better,” he says.
King is a Brummie by upbringing but long ago lost the accent. Self-confidence and a sense of purpose are his trademarks. Raised in Solihull and trained as a manager at Mars, Pepsi, GrandMet and Asda, he is part of the new breed of bosses overhauling British businesses: informal, uncomplicated, but pushy.
The Sainsbury he joined was reeling. Overtaken first by Tesco and then by Asda, and wracked by internal politics, it had conceded its position as Britain’s No1 grocer. Only last year it posted a loss of £238m on sales of £16.4 billion.
King, lured from M&S Food to replace Sir Peter Davis, is part of a determined effort to change course. He has re- emphasised the supermarket’s commitment to quality food, made sure shelves are fully stocked with items customers want, and underlined price- competitiveness.
A protégé of Sir Allan Leighton at Asda and Mars, he has also shown the same charm and driven ambition that propelled his old boss, winning over staff and media alike with quips and winks.
At Asda they wore badges showing first names only with “Happy to Help” inscribed on top. At Sainsbury — 752 stores, 153,000 employees — King is simply “Justin” to everyone. “And I am still very happy to help,” he laughs.
He is also still a long way from convincing everyone that Sainsbury really is on the turn. Shareholders have been here before — recovery was announced by Davis after buoyant trading over Christmas 2001. It did not last.
But King insists his strategy for putting sales growth before cost-cutting will bear fruit. Sainsbury has a lot of disaffected supporters — consumers who used to shop there but now go elsewhere. He is set on winning them back. Others, especially City analysts who want to see better profitability and dividends, just need to be patient.
“We’re as profitable as what we are delivering for customers at the moment allows us to be,” says King. “And shareholders understand that if we do a great job for customers that will lead to a great profit over time.”
Even Leighton, once tipped as a potential bidder for Sainsbury, thinks King’s chances of success are improving. “He has brought good people in with him who all speak the same language — that’s important. And he has done a great job — he has restored Sainsbury’s foodiness. His next challenge is to turn sales into earnings.”
King showed he could do this at M&S Food. Hired by former M&S chairman Luc Vandevelde in 2001, he headed the store’s steadiest performer. Just don’t get him started on how people perceive the current M&S recovery.
“I think history will write a different story of the M&S turnround. Luc and Roger Holmes (former chief executive) are much maligned. The sales and profitability performance of the four years Luc was there are much better than anything delivered by the current regime.”
So why did he leave? “Because I got offered the world’s greatest opportunity here, and I like doing things that others think are undoable. I’m a bit of a contrarian.”
Nothing to do with the £1m pay package? “Yeah, that helped,” he laughs. King, married with two children, keeps a Maserati in the garage at home. But he would hate his staff to see him as flash.
He adds that he also had a point to prove at Sainsbury, having worked at Mars and Häagen Dazs, supplying big retailers. Many of the team he has assembled at Sainsbury have the same background.
“Those who have worked both sides of the fence are the best equipped. I absolutely hold that. I remember coming into Sainsbury when I worked for Häagen Dazs, and it was a deeply odious experience. The chain treated suppliers really badly because of its dominant position in the marketplace. They had no desire to understand the product or the potential customer.”
He stops and smirks. “Actually, back then, being the gobby little shite that I was 16 years ago, I probably did say, if I was running it, this is how I’d do it.”
And now he has the opportunity to put it into practice. Tesco is the chain more often accused of acting high-handedly these days. That gives Sainsbury a chance to build stronger links with suppliers.
Richard Baker, chief executive of Boots and another Mars alumnus, says his old friend has the know-how to exploit this advantage. “How well you buy is key at a retailer. The cost of goods is 75% of sales. If you can understand the mindset of people selling to you, you are much better able to buy well.”
Does King think he can ever overhaul Tesco? The Sainsbury boss makes a face. “It would be risible to assert that. They are twice our size — we would have to keep growing at the current rate and they would have to stop growing for 30 years.”
He highlights more realistic goals. “When we set a target of £2.5 billion sales growth over three years, all our advisers said ‘you must be bloody mad’. Well, we are 15 months into it, and the tone now is, ‘you’re going to do that, what about everything else?’ Things move on.”
And that’s the way King likes it. Born the eldest of four brothers, he says you don’t get things done unless you stick your neck out. That’s tempered with an inborn sense of responsibility. “Something like 80% of the managers at Mars were eldest or only children,” he says. “You are made to live by different rules.”
His upbringing was neither posh nor poor — his dad was a petrochemicals salesman, his mum a housewife. “But I always had the work ethic. I wanted to buy myself stuff.”
He also wanted to work in industry and was sponsored by Lucas through Bath university, before switching to Mars. He likes being at companies where he can have an impact. That was instilled early by his father, whose story about why he left the civil service was a family favourite.
“He had a motorbike crash and was off work for six months. When he went back, his pen was still on his desk exactly where he had left it. He resigned the next day. He realised he was not making a difference.”
And that has propelled King ever since. Even when he was telling women that Häagen Dazs was better than sex? “Yeah, well, speak for yourself,” he grins, before adding, “Funnily enough, I have got four of the Häagen Dazs posters in my house. I just put them up the other night.”
And the point is? “A great product sells arse upwards,” he says and he laughs.
Vital statistics
Born: May 17, 1961
Marital status: married, with two children
School: Tudor Grange grammar, Solihill
University: Bath
First job: production shift manager, Galaxy chocolate
Salary package: £1.5m, including bonus
Homes: Warwickshire and London
Car: blue Maserati
Favourite book: Parkinson’s Law, by C Northcote Parkinson
Favourite music: Green Day
Favourite film: Apocalypse Now
Favourite gadget: Sony Ericsson mobile
Last holiday: St Lucia
Justin King's working day
THE J Sainsbury chief executive wakes at his home in Leamington Spa, Warwickshire, at 5.30am. “A car picks me up at six,” says Justin King, “and I do my letters and phone calls during the two-hour journey into London. I do the same on the way home in the evening.”
Once in the office, he looks at sales figures, then goes into meetings. He leaves an hour free to spend with his top team. “I worry about the little things that might be indicators of bigger problems. I read every letter sent in from outside or from colleagues. I am always asking, what is this telling me about the business?”
He rarely lunches out and tries to leave at 6pm. If he is working late he will stay at his flat in Bloomsbury. “Then it’s 2,000 steps on the way in,” he grins, pointing to the Sports Relief pedometer on his belt.
Downtime
JUSTIN KING relaxes by getting involved in his children’s sports. He coaches his son’s under-13 village football team. “I teach them not to do bloody silly things like let the ball bounce from corners, or turn your back on the ball when it’s coming over,” he says. “I think parents should get involved. I’m not one of those who would say he’s too busy.”
He also attends Manchester United occasionally. “Of course I support Man U, I’m from Birmingham.”
Some of his salary goes on cars, boats and homes. The family has three dinghies – they sail at Hayling Island. Otherwise most weekends he is family chauffeur. “Now the kids have moved on to horseriding and motor-racing — and the less said about that the better — my weekends involve chasing them all over the country. If I spend money, it’s generally to buy back time with my family.”
