Sir Terence Leahy, former CEO of Tesco, has told BBC Panorama that the supermarket giant allowed the trust of its millions of customers to be eroded, adding that there had been a failure of leadership under his successor, Philip Clarke.
Sir Terry, the son of Irish immigrants who settled in Liverpool, started at Tesco as a shelf stacker.
He has been widely credited with building Tesco into one of the world's largest and most successful retailers, presiding over 14 years of growth in profits and sales.
He told the BBC’s Panorama that losing its reputation for low prices was very damaging for Tesco.
The supermarket now faces intense price competition from the likes of Asda, Lidl and Aldi, and has fared badly in comparison.
Sir Terry said: “Tesco is the biggest; people expect it to have the best prices. They need to know they can trust Tesco to deliver that — and not have to shop around and check they're getting the best deal.
"I think that some of that trust has been eroded, which has meant that people have shopped around."
He added: “In the end that's a failure of leadership, not a failure of the business, not a failure of the people who work hard every day in the business.
"When you're the CEO, if it goes well, you get credit, if it doesn't go well, you must take responsibility and Phil Clarke has taken that responsibility and paid the price with his job."
With regards rumours that relationships in top level management at Tesco had become divisive and bitter after his departure - leading to many resignations - Sir Terry said: “I think it lost too much talent... It's a big company, Tesco, and also very empowering — people were given responsibility and trusted to get on with their job. So there was a big team of experienced leaders.
"But too many of those were allowed to go in too short a period of time, and so there was a shortage of experience — the kind of experience you need to carefully navigate a business like Tesco through this very turbulent and difficult period of this long, long recession... [Especially] with so many changes in structure of retailing taking place."
He added: "I think the culture did change under Phil Clarke and not for the better."
In a previous appearance on the BBC, Sir Terry told Desert Island Disc’s Kirsty Young that his earliest memory was as a three-year-old being taken by his parents back home to Ireland.
He added: “My roots matter a lot. I’m an immigrant in a way. My parents are Irish Catholic, but I grew up in Liverpool. There I benefited from an outstanding free education.”
Sir Terry’s father was a ship’s carpenter in the Merchant Navy, and served during World War II.
He contracted TB and thereafter became a greyhound trainer. Sir Terry’s mother was a nurse.
