John Lewis chair Dame Sharon White has claimed the business will return to profit this year, as it gears up to slash up to 11,000 jobs under its turnaround plan.
The businesswoman told workers John Lewis would “more than break-even” after it made a £234m loss last year.
Speaking in a video message, White said staff should prepare for “quite big changes and quite bold changes”.
The announcement follows news that the retailer was considering cutting at least 10% of its staff over the next five years.
The business is also halving its workers’ redundancy pay, insisting it needs to make this more affordable.
Additionally, John Lewis is in the process of cutting £900m worth of costs out of the company.
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The chair said: “There’s been an awful lot of change over the past year.
“But those efforts are starting to show themselves in our commercial performance, we are converting more of our sales into return to partners, and we will more than breakeven this year, which is a great start as we build back to sustainable profit for the business.”
Earlier this month, John Lewis hired one of its former directors, ex-Jigsaw boss Peter Ruis, to run its department store business.
Ruis is set to lead the business “through the next phase of its transformation”, the company said.
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4 Comments. Leave new
First thing she did when she arrived was store closures and redundancies, now she is leaving more partner redundancies and still no profit. What a legacy Sharon White leaves !!
Sharon white also sold off the flooring department and staff. How can they say it’s a partnership when you sell us off. One member of staff had 49yrs service. I had 22 yrs service, I lost my long leave, discount and redundancy. We were just kicked out! Such a nice business? not any more !
Dame Sharon White. Oh dear. So, you can tick the boxes but can you deal with the bottom line? You can’t pay the creditors with an ESG score.
First thing she did when she came in closed shops and made redundancies, last thing she does before she leaves more redundancies what a legacy!!