Sir Ken Morrison - a giant of retail
Everyone has their favourite Sir Ken Morrison story, but one of the best tells how he was spotted rooting inside the bins behind a Morrisons’ store to establish whether fresh food was being wasted.
Sir Ken, who died on Wednesday after a short illness at the age of 85, didn’t care what anyone else thought of him. He was known to open packs of sandwiches at random to check for freshness.
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Hide AdHe didn’t believe in statistics and IT projections - his philosophy was based on common sense.
When asked the secret of running a good supermarket, he once replied: “It’s just taking money off people. And giving them something in return.”
In the words of ex-Asda boss Allan Leighton, Sir Ken was one of the canniest retailers in the business.
But his star fell dramatically following the ill-fated 3.35bn takeover of Safeway in 2004, but he recovered and left the business on a high in 2008.
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Hide AdOver the past nine years, he has taken a more backseat role, but that didn’t stop him from stepping in when he felt that former CEO Dalton Phillips was taking the business in the wrong direction.
Three years ago, he made the headlines when he told the group’s AGM in Bradford: “The results were described by the chairman and chief executive as ‘disappointing’. I personally thought they were disastrous.
“When I left work and started working as a hobby, I chose to raise cattle. I have something like 1,000 bullocks and, having listened to your presentation, Dalton, you’ve got a lot more bulls**t than me.”
Sir Ken said he had previously warned that changes being implemented by the new management would damage the business and that the latest results had proved him right.
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Hide AdHowever he was very happy about the appointment of Tesco veteran David Potts, who took over the reins in 2015.
A few weeks ago Morrisons reported its best Christmas performance for seven years and raised its profit guidance as customers flock back to its stores.
The Bradford-based chain report a better than expected 2.9 per cent rise in like-for-like sales over the nine weeks to January 1.
The company his father William established in 1899 is once again putting its rivals in the shade.
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Hide AdSir Ken perfected the art of deflecting questions about his business methods with a quick one-liner, designed to stop you in your tracks.
When asked by analysts how Morrisons’ goes about its store-siting policy he grumpily replied: “Well, we get on a bus and we look for chimney pots.”
One retail analyst said: “You did wonder sometimes whether he was playing with you.
“When you asked him about the numbers, he used to say he didn’t know about that side of things and then pass you on to the finance director.”
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Hide AdWhen asked whether Morrisons would consider taking on management consultants to help with the integration of Safeway he gruffly replied: “If you don’t know how to run your own business, it’s time to give up isn’t it?”
In 1967, Sir Ken led Morrisons on to the stock market in London in a share offer which was 174 times oversubscribed as more than 80,000 investors tried to buy a stake.
Expansion across the North of England continued and in 1998 Morrisons opened its first store in the South - in Kent - before opening its 100th store in its centenary year in 1999.
Analyst Clive Black, of Shore Capital, paid a glowing tribute to Sir Ken.
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Hide Ad“Without Sir Ken many hundreds of thousands of British families and businesses would not have had their working and commercial livelihoods; many folks will be thankful to him this day.
“Sir Ken had a great empathy with shoppers, unwavering high standards, a huge retailing imagination, a naughty sense of humour and just a proper way of doing things that many will say is sadly too lacking these days.”