In researching a best-in-class case study about communicating, I had a lovely British co-worker introduce me to Tesco. A brand that two weeks ago was completely foreign to me has become, in my mind, a quintessential expression of everything communicates.

If you hail from the daughter country, as I do, let me ‘touch a spot’ on Tesco.
It is the Wal-Mart of Europe and was (up until a few years ago) always trailing its competitor, Sainsbury. Tesco was known for their “piling it high, and selling it cheap” mentality. Now they are respected as the best in their industry–even better than Sainsbury. How did they do it?

Their underdog story begins in the early 80’s there was a fundamental shift: a shift to quality. This quality change was a 10-year process that had its first marketing attempt in the early 90’s with the “Quest for Quality” campaign. While these measures did increase loyalty 7%, it only increased new business penetration 1%. Sainsbury, in that same time, had beaten them in both departments.

It was time to take off the gloves.

The climactic apex of this shift happened almost by accident: “Every Little Helps.” This clever tag line designed originally as an ad campaign, became much more than a tag line; it became a call to action for employees and a brand promise for consumers. Tesco not only pasted it on every commercial (or advert, if you will), but they put it into the core of their store. Tesco’s websites states, “The philosophy of Every Little Helps is behind everything we do – it’s not just something we say, we really do mean it. Really.” And might I add, really.

They rolled out 114 real initiatives to improve the store experience and solidify Tesco as a place where they do every little to help. No ground was too sacred to leave un-“Every Little Helps”-ified. Some of these initiatives included baby-changing facilities, removal of sweets from checkout lines, value cards, mother-child upfront parking, price matching, training for employees to put forth extra effort, home delivery service, one-in-front checkout system (where they would add another cahier if there was more than one person in front of you until all of the registers were being used), etc. etc. and etc. 114 of these “little” things that made a difference. Every initiative showed that Tesco wasn’t just trying to push poor products (triple alliteration=2 points), but that they were concerned and working for the holistic betterment of the consumer’s life—even if it just a “little” bit. They didn’t just say; they did. The silent integration of such a grand brand promise is a strong form of communication. And consumers heard.

Tesco took the number one position in their market in 1995 and has remained there to this day.

This is the kind of stuff that Disney will buy the rights for: a down in the dumps place trying to get better unsuccessfully; but after years of work and by using honesty, they finally succeed. The Rudy of retailers, Tesco has proven that “every little [thing] helps” to communicate.