‘It’s like being handed the crown jewels,” says James Bailey, who was given the task of running Waitrose, the upper-crust supermarket, just as the pandemic hit. “You don’t want to be the person that drops it.”
Bailey’s unenviable fate was to arrive just as a cascade of supply chain woes and inflationary pressures made it harder than ever to convince shoppers to dish out extra cash for high quality groceries.
