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* 'Don't panic', says head of online supermarket
* Rose says there is no food shortage in Britain
* He urges people to "make your meals work"
* Rose, 71, was himself infected with virus
(Adds detail)
By James Davey
LONDON, March 26 (Reuters) - There is no shortage of food in
Britain and nobody will starve during the coronavirus emergency,
said the chairman of online supermarket Ocado who
believes he himself has been infected.
Britain's supermarket sector is dealing with unprecedented
demand during the outbreak as consumers stock-up, fearing a
prolonged period of isolation, while schools, pubs, cafes and
restaurants have been forced to close.
"The first thing is 'don't panic'. There isn't going to be
no food tomorrow," Stuart Rose told BBC radio on Thursday.
"Nobody will starve."
Rose, 71, who is also a former chairman and chief executive
of clothing and food retailer Marks & Spencer, has been
in self-isolation after suspecting he had contracted the virus.
He ventured out for the first time in two weeks on Wednesday.
He said Britons should avoid going to supermarkets at peak
hours and only buy what they need.
Rose also called on people in the country to "make your
meals work".
"If you buy a chicken, roast the chicken, have the roast
chicken dinner, the following day turn it into a stir fry, the
following day make it into soup," he said.
"You can make a relatively small amount of food go a long
way and I think we live in a very profligate society today - we
buy too much, we eat too much, we consume too much and we have
to learn new ways."
SURGING DEMAND
Ocado has been operating at full capacity during the crisis.
It said on Tuesday it had around ten times more demand for its
services than it did before the outbreak began.
During the crisis, elderly and vulnerable shoppers have
complained they have been unable to get delivery slots for
online shopping from Britain's supermarkets.
That has prompted market leader Tesco to ask
Britons who are able to safely come to stores to do so, instead
of shopping online, so it can free up more slots for the more
vulnerable.
Rose stopped short of telling young and able Ocado shoppers
to go elsewhere.
"If you've had customers who've been regular customers for
you for 10, 15 years, we can’t just dump those customers," he
said.
Rose also noted that after the government relaxed
competition rules there was "enormous" co-operation between all
retailers at present.
"If you see an unprecedented increase in demand, it's
incredibly difficult to make the adjustments. But we are all
trying, and we are working and co-operating together."
(Reporting by James Davey; Editing by Paul Sandle and Pravin
Char)
