UNDICTATED: Summers’s challenge exposed by Pick n Pay’s ’truly awful” results, shares drop 14%

Today Pick n Pay released the last set of pre-Sean Summers financial results, numbers so bad that an already depressed share price promptly dropped another 14%. The group’s 70-year-old CEO, reinstalled two weeks back some 15 years after he retired, suggested the best thing about the numbers is that founder, the late Raymond Ackerman, wasn’t around to see them. But he has a plan, and although it will take time (Summers says 18-24 months before anything profound is evident), far-sighted investors will be encouraged. In this episode of UNDICTATED, SA’s master retailer shares what brought the group so low - and his plan to turn things around. He spoke to BizNews editor Alec Hogg.