With just 10 days, or about 100 shopping hours, to go before the launch of the euro on January 1st, Irish retailers are preparing for their role in informing consumers about the new currency and reassuring them about pricing through the changeover period.

It is clear from the evidence that it will be the retailing sector that will provide the platform for the first real usage of the euro and its acceptance into the daily life of Irish households. By "real" I mean those everyday transactions around which everyday lives revolve - buying food, drink, household goods, and so on - paid for with the notes and coins earned and spent by all of us.

It is this very ordinariness that singles out the retailer, and especially the grocer, as a key educator and guide for consumers.

Whilst the financial institutions and government agencies have important roles to play in the education and communications process, their very nature means that consumers interact with them on a more sophisticated level and with less regularity. Retailers, especially grocery retailers, process millions of transactions every week. Tesco Ireland, for example, each week processes up to one million transactions worth about £15 million made up of items ranging in price from under 20p to over £150. So, grocers and other retailers will play a key role, not just with implementing the mechanics of the changeover, but also in showing consumers how the changes will actually work.

Interestingly, the euro decision-makers have chosen January 1st as the key date for the introduction of these changes - January 1st, 1999, for the currency launch, and January 1st, 2002 for notes and coins. Early January is traditionally a very busy time for retailers, with the January sales following the Christmas rush. Introducing these currency changes smoothly will require extensive planning and careful management in all stores.

The retailer's approach to the euro should be a simple one - with a consumer-driven focus on everything done throughout the changeover period. The aim should be not only to have shoppers happily using the euro, but also thinking in euros and handling the currency in the second-nature manner they currently use Irish pounds. In a word, the consumer should find shopping with the euro as normal as they have found shopping with the Irish pound.

Our strategy for the change-over is spread across two distinct phases:

Phase 1: January 1st, 1999 - December 31st, 2001 - the transition phase. During this period:

- we will accept non-cash euro payments (cheques and credit card debits);

- issue customers with till receipts denominated in both Irish pounds and euros;

- intensify our educational effort for staff and customers; and - gradually phase in dual pricing.

We will also convert all dealings with suppliers to euros from January 1st, 2001, in accordance with the FDT's Code of Practice.

Phase 2: January 1st, 2002 to July, 2002 - the dual currency phase - when euro notes and coins will circulate alongside the Irish pound.

Already, our checkout receipts give the total amount in both Irish pounds and euros. This will play a vital part in familiarising shoppers with the conversion process and, crucially, building awareness of and confidence in the exchange rate, demonstrating our commitment to full transparency of pricing and conversion.

It is worth noting that Ireland is in the unique and unenviable position of being the only country in which the conversion results in an increase in the nominal figure. A sliced pan, which currently sells for 49p will cost 61 cents. The second phase outlined above deals with the issues raised by the introduction of euro notes and coins. Are we to adopt the `Big Bang' approach, whereby the euro supplants all national currencies overnight? Or will we, as seems more likely, have a transitional period in which both currencies circulate alongside each other? From everyone's point of view, the shorter this period of dual circulation, the better.

Research conducted by Amarach Consulting has discovered that nearly one in two people suspect that the change-over will serve as a smokescreen behind which profiteering retailers can rack up prices at will. The experience of decimalisation, and an assumption that Irish prices will tend towards mainland European levels, are the two main drivers behind this suspicious mindset.

I would like to see all retailers working together to advance the change-over process, retaining confidence in pricing. The introduction of the euro is a momentous event, one affecting us all equally, and therefore should be addressed in a collaborative and mature way, to the benefit of everyone involved. Customers would be both assisted and comforted by the greater consistency a co-ordinated campaign would bring to the educational process while the sector would gain through a sharing of the overall cost burden.

It is in no-one's interest that the consumer loses confidence and trust in the euro. Public confidence is a very fragile thing, and, once replaced by cynicism can be very difficult to recapture.

Maurice Pratt is managing director of Tesco Ireland