In a wide-ranging speech at the Retail Week Conference in London today, Stefano Pessina, executive chairman of Alliance Boots, said that rolling out the Boots brand and name across Europe, as well as improving the store portfolio in the UK, would be at the core of the retailer’s strategy.

He explained that while the Boots brand remained very powerful in this country there had been a failure to exploit it advantageously in other markets.

Pessina said that acquisition would continue to form a major element of the retailer’s strategy and expressed the desire to be “the world’s leading health and beauty group.”

He added: “When I say the leading group, I am not necessarily talking about being the largest, I am talking about being the best.”

This, he said, would mean that Alliance Boots would have to ensure its supremacy in the emerging markets as it continues to grow.

On the question of private or public, Pessina said that allowing for current macro-economic conditions, being a private company would probably suit a retailer’s needs better than being subject to the scrutiny of stockmarkets.

He concluded by saying that there had been a somewhat short-term focus in much that had been done at Boots prior to the 2006 takeover and that in future there would have to be “a long-term approach to value creation.”

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