LONDON — British retail giant John Lewis and supermarket Waitrose, owned by the John Lewis Partnership, is undergoing internal changes in line with speculations from British tabloid newspapers after a shaky 12 months.

The corporate has warned of potential job cuts and has scrapped its staff bonus after a 230-million-pound loss consequently of inflation and energy bills within the U.K. 

The 2022-23 fiscal 12 months results showed that John Lewis and Waitrose group sales were 12.25 billion kilos, a 2 percent dip from the previous 12 months. As an entire, the group reported a 78-million-pound loss.

John Lewis sales rose by 16 million kilos on a like-for-like basis with last 12 months, but its overall sales only rose by 0.2 percent in total.

Dame Sharon White, chair of the partnership, is toying with the concept of bringing outside investors into the business by selling a minority stake, which might fracture the staff’s one hundred pc ownership.

The ownership model is a singular one to John Lewis and has turn into a sacred a part of the corporate since 1950.

In 2020, John Lewis closed eight of its stores, including one at Birmingham’s Grand Central center that cost 35 million kilos to construct and only survived five years. However the senior shake-up inside its fashion division has helped the category buck the group’s overall troubles.

Kathleen Mitchell joined the business in 2021 as business director, and she or he was answerable for the hiring of John Lewis’ first director of design for fashion, Queralt Ferrer; Heena Mohammed as beauty lead; Claire Miles as head of own brand fashion, and Beth Pettet as head of fashion brands.

Mitchell, a L’Oreal and Accessorize alum, has helped increase fashion sales on the retailer by 13.7 percent within the fiscal 12 months ending Jan. 28.

“This latest team has streamlined our in-house ranges and branded collections to supply our customers something fresh and a reason to purchase something latest. We’ve worked hard to maneuver past the concept of consumers coming to us only for ‘basics,’ giving each of our in-house brands — Anyday, And/Or, John Lewis and Kin — their very own design handwriting,” Mitchell told WWD.

John Lewis launched 251 brands within the last fiscal 12 months — with 109 going down in fashion, 114 in home and 14 in beauty and technology.

Men’s fashion was essentially the most successful category, with a 20 percent year-on-year increase. Womenswear sales rose 17 percent.

“The tailoring market is back in a giant way and over the past 12 months we now have been busy behind the scenes developing an all-new proposition, latest suits, modernized constructions and luxury fabrications with us being certainly one of the one high street retailers to supply Ermenegildo Zegna fabrics inside our suiting,” said Mitchell.

“We’re responding to the changing needs of our customers, with a giant concentrate on seasonal events, weddings and eveningwear,” she added.

Top categories that soared included dresses, rising 42 percent vs last 12 months; shirts and blouses up by 36 percent, and skirts increasing 28 percent. However it was luggage that outshone all of the others with sales increasing by 210 percent in comparison with the 12 months before.