COMPARE AND CONTRAST BRITISH SUPERMARKET CHAIN WAITROSE LTD (Essay Sample)

COMPARE AND CONTRAST BRITISH SUPERMARKET CHAIN WAITROSE LTD Name: University: Course: Tutor: Date: Introduction Waitrose is comprised of a chain of British supermarkets. These chains form the food retail division of the John Lewis Partnership. The ownership of Waitrose is different from other businesses, for example, a small high-street retailer in many aspects. This paper will consider the ownership style, how profits and losses are shared in the company, and how responsibility is shared by the owners (Cox, 2010). The ownership model adopted by Waitrose is unique in the market. It is part of the John Lewis partnership. It is a retailer's employee-owned partnership. This implies that the retail employees at Waitrose have a stake of the company. They are owners of the company and, therefore, whatever they do in their day to day work directly affects the state of the company in which they have a direct interest. This ownership model is different from the normal high-street retailer; here, the ownership is either sole trader or partnership. This implies that a person is directly responsible for the day to day running of the business and, therefore, is responsible for the success or the failure of the business. In a partnership, the founding members or the owners share the responsibility of running a business and therefore share in its success or failure (Taylor, 2012). The success of a business depends on a good ownership model and a clear vision of objectives and how to realize them. Waitrose's staff from the chairman all the way down to the shelf stackers receives the same payout percentage. The payout can rise or fall depending on the performance of the company in the market and whether it is making profits or posting losses. The staffs, who are also the owners, share the profits or the losses. Private equity backed businesses have models that are very different from the Waitrose model; here, profits flowing to the owners of the business, often the sole owners or the partners in a partnership. In Waitrose the profits flow to the staff (Spence & Bourlakis, 2009). Employee ownership is a form of industrial democracy. The employees have ownership of the company; this gives them the extra responsibility of ensuring the company does well. The employees tend to be more responsible and discharge their duties better and ensure that no one does harm the company's interests. This is unlike in private equity backed businesses where the employees do not share in the profits of the business. They are paid their salaries irrespective of whether the company does extremely well, but bear the brunt when the company does poorly (Wood, 2012). The approximately 76, 500 staff that work for John Lewis are partners and they therefore they ultimately own the retailers 35 stores and the272 Waitrose supermarkets. This ownership model means that it is in the staff's best interest to work since they are direct beneficiaries (Taylor, 2012). According to a case study creating differentiation in the marketplace through premium and ethical retailing (2007), responsibility is shared among the Waitrose staff, from the chairperson to the shelf stackers....