Justin King is to step down as CEO of Sainsbury’s after a decade in charge of the UK grocer. King has revitalised Sainsbury’s, taking a business with stock issues to one that has consistently outperformed its rivals in recent years. Here’s a look at the key events of King’s reign.
November 2003
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Sainsbury’s announces Justin King, the head of Marks and Spencer’s food business, as chief executive, replacing Peter Davis. The news came alongside half-year results that included a 0.1% rise in like-for-like sales.
March 2004
King takes the Sainsbury’s hot seat. Within days, there is speculation US private-equity giant KKR is rumoured to be mulling a bid if King fails to turn the business around.
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May 2004
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By GlobalDataSainsbury’s reports 3% fall in annual profits. King shakes up management team, with the departure of Stuart Mitchell, the MD of its supermarkets business. All Sainsbury’s senior executives to report into King.
August 2004
The retailer heralds its first significant move into the UK convenience channel under King with the acquisition of c-store group Jacksons Stores.
October 2004
Data from the then TNS Superpanel indicate Sainsbury’s has halted the decline its share of the grocery market. For the 12 weeks to 10 October, Sainsbury’s share stood at 15.4%.
May 2005
Sainsbury’s reports another year of falling profits but King says turnaround is “on track”.
May 2006
The grocer books a 12% rise in annual underlying profits, ahead of market forecasts. King said the end of the financial year had seen the company’s fifth consecutive quarter of like-for-like sales growth.
February 2007
A private-equity consortium consisting of CVC Capital, Kohlberg Kravis Roberts, Blackstone and Texas Pacific Group announced it was evaluating the possibility of a takeover bid for the retailer.
April 2007
The consortium withdraws its offer after failing to win over the Sainsbury family, then the retailer’s largest shareholder.
Weeks later, Qatar-based investment group Delta (Two) Ltd became Sainsbury’s biggest investor. The fund and another shareholder, property tycoon Robert Tchenguiz, are said to place pressure on Sainsbury’s to divide its grocery business from its property portfolio.
June 2007
Delta, a vehicle of the Qatari royal family, ups stake in Sainsbury’s to 25%, prompting renewed takeover speculation.
December 2007
Sainsbury’s expresses “disappointment” at a decision from the UK’s Office of Fair Trading to fine the retailer GBP26m for fixing dairy prices in 2002 and 2003.
May 2008
Sainsbury’s full-year profits jump, prompting King to say the retailer had “fulfilled the commitments” the company made when it launched its turnaround strategy – dubbed Making Sainsbury’s Great Again – in 2004.
June 2009
Sainsbury’s announces plans to launch a GBP445m fund-raising programme to accelerate its expansion in the UK. The retailer’s ambition is to grow its floor space by 15% – or 2.5m sq ft – by March 2011.
March 2011
King says Sainsbury’s has exceeded its space target, with a rise of 15.9% in the two years to March 2011. However, fourth-quarter same-store sales, excluding inflation, fell between 0.5-1% once the impact of VAT and store extensions was removed. King said the “tough” trading environment was the consequence of a more cautious – and poorer – consumer.
October 2011
Sainsbury’s rolls out its Brand Match price-comparison initiative throughout the UK in a bid to emphasise the value it says consumers can get from its offer.
May 2012
The retailer books a 7% increase in annual underlying profits, ahead of City forecasts. A month later, reporting sales for the first quarter of its new financial year, King says the grocer has “maintained our outperformance of the market”.
October 2012
UK advertising watchdog The Advertising Standards Authority bans a spot for Brand Match, calling it “misleading”. King says Sainsbury’s had stopped running the ads a year earlier.
Later that month, King calls on the UK food industry to adopt common front-of-pack nutrition labels.
December 2012
Sainsbury’s dismisses reports King could step down as chief executive in two months’ time.
March 2013
King brushes off news of Tesco‘s national roll out of its own price-comparison scheme, which, unlike Brand Match, includes own label. He says: “We would say that most of our own label is not comparable to that sold by our competitors. We sell much more high-end [products]. Our customers tell us these things make our own label higher quality and therefore price comparing to them with products that are not as good and not as greater provenance is not a fair comparison
May 2013
King reveals he could see the UK grocer having over 1,000 convenience stores in its estate, up from the over 520 in its network. Sainsbury’s plans to increase the proportion of its space made up by convenience stores to reflect a change in consumer habits that had started in the teeth of the downturn and had stuck, King says – top-up shopping. Sainsbury’s also announces sales from both its convenience stores and its online service are worth over GBP1bn.
July 2013
The ASA clears Tesco’s Price Promise comparison scheme after a complaint from Sainsbury’s, which calls the ruling “unfair” and “contradictory”.
October 2013
It emerges Sainsbury’s is to take its battle with Tesco over the retailers’ price comparison schemes to a judicial review.
January 2014
Sainsbury’s share of the UK’s grocery market now matches Asda, the country’s second-largest retailer, according to the latest data from Kantar Worldpanel. For the 12 weeks to 5 January, both Asda and Sainsbury’s accounted for 17.1% of grocery retail sales in the UK. Sainsbury’s was the only one of the UK’s five largest grocers to hold their share of the market in the face of increasing sales at discounters including Aldi and Lidl at one end of the market and the continued growth at upmarket grocer Waitrose at the other.
On 29 January, Sainsbury’s announces King will leave the UK supermarket group this summer, with commercial director Mike Coupe taking the helm at the company.
