Retail Resurrection: How Alessandra Bellini Rebuilt Tesco's Brand From the Ground Up
In this CMO Superhero series of interviews, a precursor to writing a book on Share of Experience – the Superhero Metric, we explore the stories of extraordinary CMOs in building their brands. Discover key takeaways from the business and measurement challenges these CMOs face and find out what Claude.ai identifies as their three top superpowers.
Meet Alessandra Bellini.
In our latest deep dive with market-disrupting leaders, we hear how Alessandra Bellini engineered Tesco's dramatic comeback.
Q: Tesco was in crisis mode when you stepped in as Chief Customer Officer in 2017. What were you facing?
A: "I joined Tesco halfway through the turnaround since the accounting scandal, which was in 2014. We had three critical stakeholders who'd lost faith in us: customers didn't trust us, colleagues felt devalued, and shareholders were questioning their investment. The three biggest stakeholders we had, the customers, the colleagues and the market were all in a position where they didn't trust Tesco anymore.”
Q: How do you even begin to tackle that level of trust deficit?
A: By ruthlessly refocusing on what built Tesco in the first place—putting customers back at the centre of each decision. From Jack Cohen's market stall philosophy of "pile it high, sell it cheap" to pioneering self-service supermarkets and loyalty cards, Tesco's DNA was innovation for customers.
Tesco were the first to bring a self-serve supermarket format to the UK from America. They were the first to be against the price maintenance agreements... they were the first to bring their own brand ranges to the market and to launch a loyalty card with Tesco Clubcard.
We had to get back to that fundamental truth.
For each decision we took, we asked what would customers really think about it? Would they be prepared to pay for that benefit?
When I joined the company, we were running stores. We had to make the shift to serving customers.”
Q: You mentioned bringing consistency to a scattered brand. How messy was it?
A: “Tesco had been very successful at launching a myriad of different services and propositions. As a result, we had countless logo variations, typefaces and colour schemes. Each team was essentially running their own micro-brand, independently from the mother brand.
We had to become the "brand police", which wasn’t always easy. The brand and its positioning became a filter for consistency and tone of voice.
We created frameworks for the whole company to have the right prioritisation with the understanding that customers can't be bombarded with a million different things every day. There needed to be a cadence and a consistency to what we did.
We built a strict hierarchy of customer priorities: fresh food quality first, then price, then service.”
Q: You increased share of voice while dramatically cutting the budget. That defies marketing gravity. How did you do it?
A: By being ruthless on how we spent our money. We focused on what we called “working media” (the actual media money, as opposed to agency fees and other intermediary expenses).
We consolidated agencies, streamlined processes, and scrutinized every pound. Did it have the maximum opportunity of being seen, heard, felt, experienced by the customers?
When brilliant ideas came up, we'd ask: "Is this our ninth priority? Then it's dead." Brutal? Yes. Effective? Absolutely. We ended up with fewer, bigger initiatives that actually broke through the noise.”
Q: What were your game-changing moves at Tesco?
A: “Three big bets paid off massively.
First, the "Food Love Stories" campaign—which launched right before I arrived—became our narrative backbone for eight years. Its genius was flexibility: it could showcase any product, occasion, or audience while maintaining our quality focus.
The second one was the relaunch of our own brand ranges. Tesco was the grocer that created the idea of own label with good, better, best ranges. We relaunched every single one of them, reshaped the three tiers, changed the packaging design, look and feel and strategic position for every product to give each a clear purpose.
Finally, our pricing strategy revolution: Aldi Price Match and Club Prices transformed how we approached promotions, allowing us to be laser-focused rather than scattering discounts everywhere. This was a brave move because launching a pricing platform where you talk about your competitor is not something, as a marketer, you jump on!”
It clearly worked!
I also like the way you nurtured and developed an existing asset in “Food Love Stories” rather than feeling the pressure to create something new.
Q: In a data-saturated retail world, how did you cut through the metrics chaos?
A: "We were blessed with how many ways we had to measure everything. But with that blessing came a curse: The same activity could be talked about in the company in dramatically different ways and all be true and all have a number behind it.
We went for brutal simplicity. There were three metrics that mattered:
- Effectiveness when it came to creating communication
- Brand perception and
- Customer behaviour which ultimately leads to market share, sales and profit."
Our secret weapon? Using a panel of Clubcard customers became the main way of measuring everything. This wasn't just a loyalty program—it was our measurement backbone.
Our boldest move was centralizing measurement authority. Only the Insight team, with support from finance and commercial teams, was empowered to put together an evaluation at the right time with the right numbers. One truth, one source—no debates about whose data was right.”
Q: What's your wake-up call for CMOs who are playing it safe?
A: Stop thinking of marketing as social media posts and ads. That's dangerously narrow thinking. True marketing is understanding the commercial reality of your business and connecting it to customers through everything you touch—product, packaging, channels, people.
Demonstrate equal creative and commercial acumen. You're not just a creative force—you're a business catalyst who happens to use marketing as your toolset. The moment you let yourself get boxed into "marketing communications," you've already lost the boardroom battle. Bring equal firepower to creative and commercial conversations, or watch your influence evaporate.
What strikes me in our conversation is how the business focus shines through. And in doing so, how your style embodies the brand that Jack Cohen built.
What should we take away?
- Trust is your foundation – When stakeholder trust is broken, rebuilding it must be your primary focus. Tesco had to simultaneously rebuild trust with customers, colleagues, and shareholders.
- Consistency beats creativity – Brand discipline creates the framework for effective creativity. As Alessandra says, "The brands that are managed most tightly" are those that can then truly innovate.
- Measure what matters – Cut through metrics overload by focusing on three key areas: communication effectiveness, brand perception, and customer behavior that drives business results.
- Less, but bigger – Increasing share of voice while reducing budget is possible when you ruthlessly prioritize and eliminate fragmented spending across too many initiatives.
- Marketing is business – "You're a business person solving business problems, using your specific professional capabilities to do so." Position marketing as a commercial function, not just a creative one.
To discover what Claude.ai thinks of Alessandra’s superpowers click here.
Facebook: www.facebook.com/MESHExperience
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/company/mesh-experience
Author: Fiona Blades: https://www.linkedin.com/in/fionablades/