Speaking after posting robust first quarter results yesterday, Ken Murphy said that M&S and some of the Co-op’s independent societies asked Booker for support sourcing products while their supply systems were down.
“Over the period when they’ve been impacted, Booker has supplied both M&S and Co-op with products and supported them in any way they could,” he told The Times. “They asked us to supply products, and we said yes.”
In M&S’s case, Booker is understood to have increased deliveries of third-party branded items, such as Marmite and Coca-Cola, and shipped more items directly to shops.
The main Co-op Group did not request assistance for its stores, but the report by The Times said that some of its independent societies temporarily turned to Booker.
The support was short-term, and both companies have since restored their operations after the cyber attack.
Last week, Co-op said its recovery from the hacking incident was nearly complete.
M&S was arguably the worst affected, with it facing a hit of around £300m from the attack. Data released this week confirmed that sales in its food stores fell significantly during the period after it struggled to keep shelves stocked.
Tesco, which yesterday reported a better-than-expected 5.1% increase in like-for-like sales during its first quarter, insisted that this had not been because of the cyberattacks at M&S and Co-op. “We haven’t seen any uptick in activity or attacks since some of our competitors were attacked,” Murphy said. “We haven’t seen any material changes.”
He emphasised that cybersecurity was at the “top of my inbox on a daily, weekly basis”, adding: “We stay on top of cyber all the time. We have invested continuously in upgrading our cyber capabilities because this is a moving target all the time. As the sophistication of potential attackers improves, we have to keep investing behind it.
“We stay very vigilant. We invest substantially behind it. We seek to learn from what’s going on in the industry”.
NamNews Implications:
- This brought to mind an old comment picked up from a retailer in Tokyo about its rivals:
- “Of course we compete, but only on certain things”
- Tesco’s move will not be forgotten…
