John Lewis Partnership has broken a four-year drought on staff bonuses, awarding its 69,000 employees a payment equivalent to 2% of salary after the employee-owned group posted a meaningful improvement in its financial performance.
The partnership, which operates the John Lewis department store chain alongside the Waitrose supermarket business, reported a 6% rise in underlying profits and a sales increase to £13.4bn, according to the Guardian. The bonus, roughly equivalent to an extra week's pay, is the first annual distribution to staff since the group suspended the practice amid a prolonged period of financial difficulty.
John Lewis refers to its workforce as partners, reflecting the group's unusual ownership structure in which employees hold a stake in the business. The resumption of the bonus carries significant symbolic weight, having long been regarded as a barometer of the partnership's health and a defining feature of its employee-ownership model.
The payment marks a tangible milestone for a retailer that has spent several years under pressure to restore profitability after a series of difficult trading years.
