Don't let horse meat overshadow retail's success, says BRC's Dickinson

She will address delegates at today’s BRC Retail Symposium and highlight retailers’ ability to not just survive but thrive despite the difficult economy.

Sainsbury’s boss Justin King and Tesco chief executive Philip Clarke are billed to give keynote speeches at the annual one-day conference today.

King will highlight the importance of winning customers’ trust back following the horse meat row.

Dickinson will say: “We’ve continued to deliver quality products at reasonable prices to customers who’ve had less money in their pockets. We’ve kept going through some extraordinary unseasonable weather.

“And we’ve endured the turmoil and disruption of events like the horse meat crisis and proved our food supply chains can be trusted when dire expectations about horse meat were confounded – less than 0.5% of products tested for horse meat in the UK were positive.”

Dickinson will add that retailers are also managing to plan for the future, embracing the “game-changing” digital revolution faster than any other country in the world.

“We are growing our business and our reputation internationally thanks to Brand Britain, thanks to the very high quality of our products and our excellent customer services….and thanks also to our world-leading expertise in adopting digital as a way of doing business,” Dickinson will say.