Tesco offers festive taste of things to come

Tesco Ireland was among the first of the major Irish corporates to get stuck into the festive spirit during the week, holding a "Christmas tasting" of its wares, including items from its Tesco's Finest range.

The supermarket chain took over the plush No 25 Fitzwilliam Place private dining facility in Dublin. Attendees were serenaded with Christmas carols at the entrance, before being escorted upstairs.

The biggest queue appeared to be for the cheese counter, manned by senior Tesco buying manager Barra McFeely, who was wearing a white apron, bowler hat and the works.

As Tesco’s fresh food buyer, including for dairy, you’d expect McFeely to be a bit of a cheese buff. But the man’s ability to converse about the merits of cheese was worryingly intense, until he revealed his background in the trade.

McFeely, who also previously worked for Superquinn, set up his own cheese brand, Dúnbarra, in the 1990s, before selling it to Cooleeney Farm in 1999. Cooleeney is now a Tesco supplier and one of the products it provides is Dúnbarra. So there was McFeely at the tasting, carving up wheels of the cheese that he had first produced himself almost 20 years before.

Tesco Ireland's chief executive, Andrew Yaxley, was also present at the tasting, along with a phalanx of the company's senior corporate executives. The carol singing downstairs was perfectly in tune. Let's see if Tesco's Christmas trading strategy is, too, as it arm wrestles with SuperValu for the position of top dog in the grocery market.