John Lewis boss Dame Sharon White to step down

Dame Sharon White is set to step down as the boss of the John Lewis Partnership at the end of her current five-year term. Picture: John Walton/PA Wire

By Henry Saker-Clark, PA Deputy Business Editor

Published 2nd Oct 2023, 10:57 BST

The former Ofcom chief joined the employee-owned business at the start of 2020 and has since led a major overhaul which has included a raft of store closures and a shift in new business areas such as rental accommodation.

Dame Sharon will stand down as chair of the partnership, which runs the historic department store chain and supermarket chain Waitrose, when she completes her term in February 2025.

JLP said she asked the partnership board to initiate the process to appoint a successor.

The move will make her the shortest-serving chair in the partnership’s 100-year history, according to the BBC.

Dame Sharon said: “Having led the partnership through the pandemic and the worst of the cost-of-living crisis, it is important that there is now a smooth and orderly succession process and handover.

“The partnership is making progress in its modernisation and transformation with improving results.

“There is a long road ahead and I am committed to handing on the strongest possible partnership to my successor.”

Dame Sharon described the chair role at John Lewis as a “special and unique role in UK business.”

She added: “The chairman is responsible for the long-term health of the partnership’s model, commercial success twinned with a commitment to first rate customer service and action in our communities.”

It comes weeks after the retail group posted a £59 million loss for the six months to July and said the five-year transformation plan launched by the retail group in 2020 will take two years longer than planned.

The retail group posted a £234 million loss in the last financial year, forcing it to scrap its annual bonus for staff.

The news also comes as the retailer releases its annual How We Shop, Live and Look report.

Writing in the report, commercial director Kathleen Mitchell said predictions of the death of the high street have been “overstated”, as the firm announced its proportion of sales being made online had fallen and store visits are up.

Ms Mitchell said 81 per cent of sales during the height of lockdowns were over the internet, but this had fallen back to 57 per cent, while store customers were up 8 per cent on last year.

The report reveals that, despite the washout summer, handheld fans were John Lewis’s best-selling product of the year, with sales up 481 per cent year on year. Other top sellers were men’s boxer shorts, thought to have been adopted by women as outerwear, strapless bras and outdoor sofas.