Morrisons group retail director David Lepley is leaving the business, as new CEO Rami Baitiéh sets about a process to bring fundamental change to the performance of its stores.
The supermarket has not yet formally commented on the departure of Lepley, who joined the company eight years ago and was promoted to group retail director at the start of 2020.
However, his departure comes just days after former Carrefour boss Baitiéh announced he planned to “reinvigorate, refresh and strengthen” Morrisons’ performance, including an improvement in its reputation for store standards.
Lepley, who replaced Gary Mills in his current role, spent 11 years at Asda before joining Morrisons, and served on the supermarket’s executive committee.
Last week Baitiéh admitted Morrisons had not been “on peak form”, despite announcing a like-for-like sales increase of 1.8% for the final quarter and claiming it was making “strong progress” in its bid to improve prices and loyalty.
The Morrisons boss has been holding a series of meetings with the retailer’s leadership and shoppers, promising to put customers at the heart of every decision made at Morrisons in what he said would be a “new chapter” for the retailer.
All eyes are on the new CEO as he looks to turn around the business, as well as how much money US private equity group Clayton, Dubilier & Rice will invest in stores, after last week’s £2.5bn deal to sell Morrisons’ forecourt empire to petrol station giant Motor Fuel Group.
1 Readers' comment