UK grocer Morrisons has seen first-half profits almost double as a company revamp helped to boost margins and cut costs.
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The UK’s fourth-largest retailer by sales posted a 61% leap in operating profit to GBP263.9m (US$530m) for the six months to 29 July.
The jump in profits came as Morrisons brought in an “optimisation plan”, a programme to boost sales and rebrand the business. Turnover, meanwhile, inched up 2.8% to GBP6bn.
Chief executive Marc Bolland said: “We have made a strong start to our objective of becoming the food specialist for everyone with a positive customer response to our rebranding and the many developments in store.”
Like-for-like sales rose 2.7%; Morrisons said UK grocery sales had experienced a slowdown in recent weeks. Rising interest rates and a wet UK summer had seen the UK’s largest retailers 0 including Morrisons – embark on a price war.
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By GlobalData“While the trend of greater emphasis on the health, provenance, quality and freshness of food seen in 2006 continues, in a tighter economy this has inevitably been balanced somewhat by hard-hitting price led campaigns,” Morrisons said. “We expect these to continue.”
