Asda has shaken up the leadership team of its convenience estate, with chief supply chain officer David Lepley taking direct responsibility for the Asda Express division.
As a result of the supermarket’s “strategic decision”, Asda Express MD Chris Walker, who reported into Lepley, left the business this week.
Walker had been in post since January 2024, where he was responsible for Asda Express’ retail and central operations, commercial ranging, promotions, and customer proposition operations.
With Walker no longer in the role, some of his reporting lines have also changed, Asda said.
The Express team will now report directly into Lepley, with the division also represented at a non-executive level by Jo Whitfield, who joined Asda’s board of directors earlier this year.
“We have made some changes to the Asda Express leadership structure as we continue to accelerate our plans to provide an exciting customer offer across our convenience estate,” an Asda spokesman told The Grocer.
The leadership shakeup comes as Asda announced last week it was kickstarting the next phase of its Asda Express store rollout, with up to 20 new locations planned across October.
It marks the supermarket’s return to opening standalone Express stores after integrating 469 convenience and fuel sites that it acquired from Co-op and EG Group in 2022 and 2023 respectively. The conversion programme completed in Q2 last year.
The 20 new stores will add to the nine Express sites Asda already operates, which were not part of the acquisitions.
These will be a mixture of new builds and existing sites, located in high-footfall urban areas, residential locations, and transport hubs where the retailer has traditionally had limited presence.
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