John Lewis Partnership plc published its annual report for 2014 today. Gross sales for John Lewis totalled £4.1b (+7.5%), with revenue of £3.3b (+7.4%) and an operating profit £226.1m (+4.3%).
The online channel johnlewis.com recorded gross sales of £1.1b – up £184m (19.2%). The online share accounted for 28.1% of sales. Omni-channel retail is an ongoing focus, buoyed by the growth of Click & collect (+57%).
While sales growth was shared across the categories, significant progress was made in the Home sector through initiatives such as Any Shape, Any Fabric and the maturation of the House range.
"Behind the scenes, we have invested significantly in our support infrastructure," says John Lewis MD Andy Street. "Our new £97m distribution centre will begin operations in 2015 alongside our existing Magna Park site in Milton Keynes, further enhancing our fulfilment capability.
"Shop developments continue to be a strong focus of our growth strategy. 2013/14 saw the full refurbishment of our High Wycombe shop, and we have an active pipeline of new sites. In 2013/14 we opened an at home shop in Ashford and this year we will open a full line flexible format shop in York, and our smallest shop to date at Heathrow's Terminal 2.
"We have announced future sites in Birmingham, Leeds, Westfield White City, Oxford, Chelmsford, Horsham, and Basingstoke. New catering partnerships with Joe & the Juice and Hotel Chocolat's Cocoa Bar Café were launched, alongside the first little Waitrose within a John Lewis shop at Watford.
"We continue to exploit new technology including equipping our partners with transactional tablets, and we are the first major department store to use Google to map the inside of our Oxford Street shop."
John Lewis has 40 shops in the UK – 30 department stores and 10 John Lewis at home stores – as well as johnlewis.com.
In 2013, the retailer won the following accolades: Retailer of the year (Oracle Retail Week Awards); The Nation's Best Retailer (Verdict's Customer Satisfaction Awards); and Best Retailer 2013 (Which? awards). The partnership is the largest employee-owned business in the UK.
