Bradford-based supermarket giant Morrisons said its full year total revenue excluding fuel rose 2.7% to £14.9 billion in the 52 weeks ending October 29, 2023.
Full year EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization) rose 6.5% to £970 million, with Q4 up 8.5%.
US private equity firm Clayton, Dubilier & Rice (CD&R) completed a £7 billion takeover of Morrisons in 2022.
“Across the board, Morrisons has continued the momentum developed in the latter stages of last year, with sales growth across the business, growth in EBITDA and positive free cash flow,” said Morrisons.
“Group revenue for the year, excluding fuel, was up 2.7% to £14.9bn and group LFL sales, excluding fuel, were up 3.3% for Q4 and 1.8% for the year, representing six consecutive quarters of LFL improvement.
“Retail sales, which includes supermarkets, online and convenience (from Q3 onwards), contributed 2.9% in the quarter.
“Within that, online grew 1.6% and convenience, which includes McColl’s, grew by 9%. Wholesale contributed a further 0.4% with double-digit wholesale LFL growth maintained throughout the year.”
Morrisons CEO Rami Baitiéh said: “I have been at Morrisons for only a few months, but it’s already clear that we have an abundance of talented colleagues, well located shops, high class food making operations and a real point of difference with our Market Street butchers, fishmongers, bakers, cheesemongers and deli counters.
“We’re competitive online, our convenience and wholesale operations are growing fast and I have seen the affection and goodwill that our customers, supplier partners and farmers have for Morrisons.
“Reporting today our sixth consecutive quarter of like for like sales improvement is very positive.
“But there is so much more we can do, and together with my colleagues, we are developing plans to reinvigorate, refresh and strengthen Morrisons and to start a new chapter – which begins with our customers.
“Across the business we are listening hard to what our customers are telling us and taking action, and we are just beginning to see our customer satisfaction scores improve. This will be the bedrock of our next chapter.”
Morrisons CFO Jo Goff said: “This has been a year of steady progress as we continued to invest in price, customer service, loyalty and made further improvements in our own brand range and in quality.
“We’ve made good progress on our working capital improvement process with a further £100 million in Q4, taking the total for the year to £300 million, more than half the £500 million multi-year target and ahead of our expectations.”