Morrisons is to close seven stores with the potential loss of nearly 700 jobs despite achieving a surprise increase in sales over Christmas.
Shares in the company soared 12% as it revealed a better-than-expected 0.2% rise in sales at established stores in the nine weeks to 3 January, its first positive figure for four years.
City analysts had expected like-for-like sales, which exclude the contribution from new stores or losses from store closures, to fall 2%.
The better-than-expected performance from Morrisons also lifted shares in other supermarkets, with Sainsbury’s, which reports its Christmas trading figures on Wednesday, up 4% and Tesco up 6%.
Morrisons said customers were starting to return to its stores with like-for-like transactions up 1.3% in its core supermarkets during the period. The chain has been hit by competition from the German discounters Aldi and Lidl and has cut prices to compete.
In the south we seem to have less and less stores now. I quite liked Morrisons. It was the first place I found white pudding as opposed to black pudding.
Post by Berry McPaper-cuts on Jan 12, 2016 16:02:55 GMT
My next door neighbour worked at our local Morrisons. She will never buy from them - I won't upset you by telling you why Y. Suffice to say hygiene was not a strong point.
There were no Morrisons in the UK when we moved over here (not to my knowledge). We don't have them over here either. I always thought they were up there with Asda, Tesco etc.
In the mid nineties I worked night shifts at a big branch of Sainsburys. There were no hygiene issues and we saw every inch of the place in the dead of night so if there was anything we would have seen it.
I always liked Sainsburys and we did our shopping there too. Staff discount helped of course!
My next door neighbour worked at our local Morrisons. She will never buy from them - I won't upset you by telling you why Y. Suffice to say hygiene was not a strong point.
I have similar feelings about our German discounters having worked for them