A woman's touch for Peter Jones

As part of a weekly series on women in business, BBC News Online talks to the boss of the London department store Peter Jones about a £100m refit and fears of a retail slowdown. Well-heeled Chelsea housewives treat it as their local. Even Christine Hamilton, wife of the disgraced ex-Tory MP, has been known to drop in for a few essentials.

Since 1877, the department store Peter Jones has catered to the traditional tastes of the middle classes living in and around London's Sloane Square.

But the fusty interiors and dowdy decor, once so characteristic of the store, are becoming a relic of the past thanks to one woman - managing director, Beverley Aspinall.

She is heading a £100m project to refurbish the store and bring it kicking and screaming into the present day.

"The customers love Peter Jones as it is. When they heard about the project, they said, 'Why are you changing it? It's so sweet and quaint.'

"So we had to preserve the unique essence of Peter Jones and bring it into the 21st century."

A 'modern outlook'

This has meant keeping departments in the same location and retaining some of the store's historical features.

Beverley Aspinall

1981: Joined John Lewis as a graduate trainee
1983: Promoted to department manager
1989-90: Maternity leave for two children
1995: Promoted to managing director in Peterborough
1997: Appointed MD of Peter Jones
1999: Also becomes project director for refit

But overall the place has been transformed.

Tatty carpets are fast disappearing and the new core of the building is much more in keeping with Ms Aspinall's own modern, manicured image.

However, the eponymous founder of the historic store is never far from her thoughts - she even keeps a picture of him hanging above her desk.

At first glance, it is hard to spot similarities between a glamorous, pin-striped career mum and the welsh draper who founded Peter Jones in the late 19th century.

But Peter Jones was "a man of modern outlook" opines the bumph from the John Lewis Partnership, the organisation that has owned Peter Jones since 1905.

He was also "one of the first to install electric lighting in a large store".

"If there is a heaven, I hope that he likes what we are doing," Ms Aspinall says.

Stamina

The refit - scheduled to finish in 2004 - has been described as Europe's most complex construction project.

The grade-two listed building is controlled by tight planning laws and is being re-built on a central London site with limited access.

To add to the pressure, profits at the John Lewis group have been dented by the sizeable investment in the refit (store profits are not broken out).

But Ms Aspinall, until recently a single mother, has only enthusiasm for her job.

"It's physically demanding and you have to be blessed with good health and stamina.

"But if you enjoy what you are doing, it's not stressful."

No dinosaur

Peter Jones' makeover represents more than one store's attempt to move with the times.

A history of Peter Jones

1877: Founded by draper Peter Jones
1900: Floated as a public company
1905: Jones dies and shop falters
1906: Bought by John Lewis
1914: Handed over to Spedan Lewis, son of John Lewis
1919: Store moves back into the black and staff given a share of the profits
1930: First re-build
1999: New refit begins

"It shows the refusal of the department store to decline," says Professor Gary Davies from the Manchester Business School.

Department stores were once written off as retail "dinosaurs", but have held out against strong competition from out-of-town developments.

Modern re-designs, such as airy central atriums, have played their part by tempting customers to the upper floors, where trading traditionally lagged the ground floor.

At Peter Jones, Ms Aspinall says that sales in the newly designed part of building have increased by 12%.

The end of a boom?

But department stores now face a fresh challenge as consumers appear to be reining back their spending.

The latest data indicates that annual growth rates of about 4% in the retail sector are being slowly eroded, fuelling fears that the shopping boom is over.

In July, Peter Jones immediately noticed a downturn in sales of big-ticket items, such as televisions, following turbulence on the stock markets.

"We are a barometer for the state of the economy," says Ms Aspinall.

Priorities

However, tough trading conditions apparently do not detract from the John Lewis principle of caring for employees - or "partners" as they are called.

"Making money and profits are not my prime purposes - we are here to look after the partners," Ms Aspinall says.

Appropriately, the "new system of business", designed by John Spedan Lewis in 1914 to give employees a stake in his company, was pioneered at Peter Jones to reverse a decline in profits.

"The whole structure of the partnership approach makes employees more able to address what the customer wants," says Professor Davies.

"Even sales assistants can write into the company newspaper with suggestions."

Despite initial opposition to the refit from the Peter Jones faithful, the formula still seems to be working.

In the Peter Jones restaurant, a South African customer introduces herself to Ms Aspinall.

"I hate shopping," she gushes. "This is the only shop in the world I like - and I love the refurbishment."

Ms Aspinall looks visibly relieved. Now she has only the retail slowdown to worry about.