Morrisons’ transformation gains pace
Morrisons has said it has made exceptional progress in its renewal programme after posting an uplift in first quarter sales.
In the 13 weeks to 26 January, the supermarket’s group like-for-like sales rose by 2.1% while total sales climbed by 2.4% to £4 billion.
Subscribe to TRBSales linked to Morrisons More Card reached a record high at 78% with points now awarded on every product.
Rami Baitiéh, chief executive of Morrisons, said: “Despite a challenging environment, Morrisons has made exceptional progress in a very short time and that is entirely down to the hard work, positivity, talent and customer focus of the colleagues in our stores, in our foodmaking sites and in our operations across the country.
“As I outlined in January, the cyber attack on Blue Yonder caused a far reaching period of disruption across the businesses, affecting our stock accuracy, availability, waste and forecasting. Despite this I am very pleased that we are reporting an increase in like-for-like sales in the quarter of +2.1%.”
The supermarket strengthened its management team with the appointment of Andrew Staniland as group trading director for food, Matt Heslop as director of convenience and wholesale, and Matt McLellan as group data and media director.
It also made a further £56 million of cost savings, taking the total to £668 million since the start of the programme.
Baitiéh added: “In the quarter we delivered a further £56 million of cost savings and we expect to deliver the remainder of our £700 million target ahead of schedule in the second quarter.
“We are today increasing our target to £1 billion which will help us offset cost headwinds, invest for customers and remain competitive in a fast changing market.”
Earlier this month, Morrisons announced that it was closing 52 cafes and 17 convenience stores as part of the renewal programme.
