CROSSING ALL BOUNDARIES
The sight of a Marks & Spencer branch on the high street has for decades been as emblematic of the UK as warm beer in a cosy pub. From clothing and furniture to smoked salmon and champagne, quality and value made M&S one of the UK’s best-loved blue-chip brands.
But the British retail terrain has changed greatly in the past couple of decades. Well-known department stores such as House of Fraser and Debenhams went out of business as online fashion empires such as Asos and Boohoo swept the land. And the British took to online grocery shopping more quickly and with greater gusto than anywhere else in Europe. While the French food buyer wants to sniff and peruse their produce before purchase, UK consumers are much more willing to buy fresh food online. They love the convenience, and 69% of them buy as much online as in-store.
Even M&S was not immune to this; from the early noughties, sales and market share began to decline. Stores were closed, though little food-only stores bucked the trend. Thousands of jobs were lost even before Covid struck. Last year, for the first time in 94 years, M&S posted a loss, of £87.6 million, compared with profits of £158.8m in the same period in 2019.
It was clear that management had to do something to arrest this slide. First, they took over half the business of a very successful online grocery business, Ocado, which had become
