As I look around the packed brasserie of the Peter Jones department store in Sloane Square, there doesn't seem to be much evidence of a recession. Even at midday on a Friday the well heeled crowd of ladies-who-lunch are sipping coffee and pretending that they're only having a little mouthful of that cake.

The typical Sloane Square consumer is perhaps not the best way to judge nationwide retail confidence, but the fact that this is where they choose to have lunch does indicate the effortless relationship John Lewis has with its customers.

There seems to be an enviably positive perception of John Lewis that its clientele projects onto everything that the store sells - whether it's pants, televisions or kitchens. Primark is making a killing in this downturn, but it'll never build up the kind of longlasting goodwill that John Lewis or even Marks and Spencer has - look at it this way, no one is ever going to pop into TK Maxx for a cup of coffee.

I should probably explain that, just to confuse things, Peter Jones is the onlyone of the 27 John Lewis stores that isn't actually called John Lewis, but it holds a special place in the company's history. It was the store where the concept of the partnership started and now the Grade II listed building has just finished a makeover worth over £107m.

"It got to the stage ten years ago where we had to either spend a lot of money doing it up or, and there was talk of it at the time, closing it down," explains Matt Thomas, the company's central buyer for fitted kitchens. "But you can't do that to an historical building like this, it's part of British retail history."

Thomas is talking over the top of the general hubbub of the restaurant and while he's currently in charge of kitchens for the group, he's a company - sorry, partnership - man through and through.

"I've been in the partnership for 19 years," he says, "I joined as an A-level trainee and have been in the shops for 15 years working my way up through the management levels and got into buying about three years ago.

"I think what I've been able to do since coming into kitchens as a novice is still have an affinity with the branches, I know how they work, I know how difficult it can be sometimes so I know how to communicate with them. It's improving the level of understanding of the products, talking to them about doing things as best as they can and helping them to do it."

From a kitchen perspective John Lewis is classed as a multiple retailer but its similarity to the likes of MFI, Magnet, and B&Q ends pretty quickly - it has a haberdashery for a start.

No, the seeming mistrust and expectation of disaster that seems to accompany other kitchen multiples doesn't apply to John Lewis when it comes to consumers. Clearly things go wrong and complaints happen, that's inevitable, but that underlying goodwill seems to see them through and maintain a reputation for good service and quality products.

The kitchen department of Peter Jones has had a "small tweak" in the store-wide makeover which meant losing a couple of displays but, the truth is that it's a deliberately understated and, some might say, bland experience despite the new layout. The displays are necessarily small and its position in the basement next to the white goods gives it the feeling of being stuck away in a corner. But, somehow, it all sort of works, you think no less of it for its position and layout and, well, it's just all very unflashy and very 'John Lewis'.

The kitchens themselves come in three main price points. At the top there's Alno, who have been working with John Lewis for the best part of 20 years, followed by the Main Collection which is the own-branded furniture made by Mereway. Finally, last year the company bought in an entry price-point range - the First Collection - an initiative started by Thomas.

"I started working in kitchens about three years ago and one of the first things I said to my boss was 'I must be one of the only buyers in this business who can't afford to buy his own products'," he explains. "Even though I bought everything else from John Lewis - my clothes, my white goods, my electricals - I couldn't afford to spend £12,000 on a kitchen at that stage in my life. So where do I go? Why are we alienating a large percentage of our customers and sending them somewhere else?"

The First Collection kitchens are made by Symphony and come in three door styles, rigid assembled with a five year guarantee. Thomas says his own price comparison with larger multiples puts it at about 25% cheaper than a flat pack offering.

"It allows us to get at a new audience of customers and bring down the average age and attract people in the their mid-30s rather than mid-40s," he says. "And if they're pleased with the quality of product and service the first time round, they'll come back next time when they've got more disposable income and tempt them with one of the Main Collection kitchens. So we get two purchases out of them rather than one."

The 11 displays at Peter Jones is a typical number across the 25 stores that sell kitchens (they're not in Portsmouth or the Trafford Centre in Manchester). Thomas is reluctant to talk turnover, but he does reveal an average order value of £12,000-£13,000. "It varies round the country though, Liverpool and Glasgow would be lower, Peter Jones is about average as the room sizes of Knightsbridge apartments are pretty small, but Kingston and Oxford Street would be higher."

Installation is sub-contracted and a 20% deposit is taken on ordering with the remainder two weeks before delivery.

I make the assumption that footfall through the department must be very high as it's part of a wider store and the salesmen must have trouble spotting who's a serious customer but the real problem, Thomas says, is that many people don't realise John Lewis does kitchens at all.

"To be honest, I think most of our sales come from word of mouth," he says. "One of the biggest challenges for me is that John Lewis kitchens is one of the best kept secrets in the marketplace. I reckon if you polled customers walking round the store and asked them, half of them wouldn't know we did them.

"That's changing, but if we can shout about kitchens more we have a huge potential to grow."

Undersold

John Lewis' famous delightfully old-fashioned catchphrase of 'Never Knowingly Undersold' is as old as Peter Jones, and that's fine if you're buying a washing machine but how does that apply to kitchens?

"The only branded kitchen we have is Alno," Thomas says. "So we occasionally get undersell comparison with that. If you sit down and compare our plan with the competitor's plan they may have used a different unit, so like-for-like we will normally come out under. If an independent wants to slash its prices to beat us then we'd obviously have to meet like-for-like sales."

But presumably that means every component would have to be exactly the same?

"If, for example, we'd planned a pull-out larder or magic corner but the independent has just put a standard unit in then that's not a like-for-like comparison," he says. "What we try and do is work to the customer's budget and stick to that criteria so I probably only get an email every three or four months, so it's not a big issue. With white goods it's very clear, but with kitchens there's always differences."

I met Thomas before the latest sales figures came out of John Lewis, which don't make for pleasant reading if seen as a reasonable barometer of High Street retail. In the week to October 11 sales fell by 4.8% to £48.9m. This included a 3% slump at the Oxford Street store but Peter Jones was reported to have seen sales drop by 14.9% - thanks to its local customer-base of City workers.

However, previous figures had shown a significant decrease too when I put it to Thomas.

"Don't get me wrong," he says. "It's not as easy as it was last year and I think it will slow down over the coming months and we're starting to see the first signs of that. Customers are now taking longer to decide on their purchase so we've just got to be timely in our follow up and ensure we've done the best job we can to get that sale."

Marketing and PR are one way to boost sales and the company hit the headlines earlier in the year for the infamous 'John Lewis list'. It was revealed that MPs were given certain allowances for buying furniture and other items for their second homes. The allowances were drawn up using prices from the John Lewis website and included £10,000 for a kitchen and nearly £6,500 for a bathroom. So, is all publicity good publicity?

"It didn't do us any harm," Thomas laughs. "I can't say it would be at the top of my wish list of things I'd like to be associated with but it'll probably be the only time in history that John Lewis fitted kitchens are the lead story on BBC News. If nothing else, that told three to four million people that we sold kitchens."

John Lewis is built on two founding principles, one is the 'Never Knowingly Undersold' and the other is a respect for its customers - and its staff. Throughout our discussion   Thomas only ever refers to John Lewis as "the partnership" and its 69,000 staff as "partners" - and he means it. The company's founder gifted the business to its workers, a visionary approach that is still paying off and it is that mutual respect that gives John Lewis its reputation with customers and partners.

"I've worked for the partnership for 19 years and will probably carry on until I retire," he says. " While I'm in retail, I don't see the point in working for any other organisation. I believe I'm working for the best, it's not just about the products, it's about the way we treat each other."

John Lewis

• John Lewis opened first shop in 1864
• Son John Spedan Lewis founded the partnership in 1914
• All employees are co-owners of the business and profits are split
• There are 27 stores and 69,000 employees
• Kitchens made by Alno, Mereway and Symphony
• Average kitchen value £12,000
• John Lewis branded appliances are by far the biggest seller