The Guardian view on Marks & Spencer: challenge of the demand for choice | Editorial
Marks & Spencer is not dying: it owns more than a thousand stores, often in prime high street sites. Last year, it made more than 600m profit. Its revenues are huge: over 10bn, which is about the equivalent of the GDP of a country the size of Malta. So there is plenty of life in it yet. But it is wounded, and trying to heal it is turning out to be much harder than even Marc Bolland, the smooth-talking Dutch chief executive expected. On Thursday, along with disappointing clothes and homeware sales figures, he announced his unexpectedly early departure.
If restoring this behemoth of the retail economy to robust good health was going to be easy, it would have happened years ago. Mr Bolland is well-regarded. The company's share price has been on an erratic but generally upward trajectory ever since he took over more than five years ago. He appears to have cracked the worst glitches in the digital sales business, and the food side continues to grow at a steady rate. But the old staples of knickers and knitwear are floundering and the search for the perfect homeware offer goes on. Retail analysts think his successor, Steve Rowe, will have an easier task than Mr Bolland did. There are plenty of reasons why he won't.
Continue reading...