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Marks and Spencer's Ups and Downs
M&S in 2003
First establishment of this company was back in 1880s by Michael Marks. It was known as a most recognized brand on a penny bazaar. As it started to expand and needed a support, it made a partnership with Tom Spencer, and since then Marks & Spencer steadily grew.
Ever since its establishment, appointing of CEOs was always inside the members of the founder's family or a lifetime employee. The first exception was made in 2000 when appointing Luc Vandevalde. In year 2003 the position of and CEO was given to the Roger Holmes, we was firstly made a head of M&S UK retailing, and latter on given this position when the former CEO wanted to withdraw.
Although during all these years Marks& Spencer steadily grew, their success and profits had a lot of ups and downs. There can be discovered a general trend. As it can be seen in Appendix 1 all the profitability ratios have reached their lowest point in 2001 and more or less increased to the same level in 2003 as it was in 1998. However in year 2003 they reported on their second successful Christmas period, which had risen their sales by 6.7 %, but on the other side at the beginning of the year company had to make further mark-downs because of the higher cost( compared to the year 2001), which lead to the reduction of their share price by 6 per cent.
In order to recover they had to make serious moves. Cutting its contractors and saving up to 20 m pounds per year, and introducing nationwide credit cards and loyalty card schemes, helped them in achieving a rise in both in profits and dividends. To keep M&S recovering the priority of the company was to focus on food and clothing, openi ...