LONDON, March 25 (Reuters) – British retail marketing consultant and tv character Mary Portas has written an open letter to the John Lewis Partnership accusing the group of shedding its soul for contemplating a change to its longstanding mannequin of worker possession.
Final week, the partnership, which owns John Lewis department shops and the upmarket Waitrose grocery store chain, confirmed it was contemplating promoting a minority stake within the enterprise to exterior buyers to fund funding.
The partnership has warned it must reduce workers numbers and scrap any bonus this 12 months after its prospects lowered spending, prompting its annual loss to balloon to 234 million kilos ($286 million).
“In some way, in recent times, you have let go of the soul,” wrote Portas, often known as the “Queen of Retailers” on account of her efforts to save lots of the UK excessive road.
She accused John Lewis of “chasing the brand new. New methods, new individuals, new id…new homeowners. However here is the factor: that is not what we actually need from John Lewis”.
John Lewis’ Chairman Sharon White wrote again to Portas insisting she would make sure the partnership not solely survives, however thrives.
“Our Companions (workers) who personal the enterprise are our best asset and our possession of the Partnership will stay,” she stated, however added: “We have at all times been open to new partnerships with buyers or like-minded corporations to share our progress.”
($1 = 0.8177 kilos)
Reporting by James Davey; modifying by Jason Neely
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