John Lewis Partnership chairman Jason Tarry has stated that the business is “determined to pay a bonus as soon as we possibly can”, after staff were left without the benefit for another year.

The Partnership reported its pre-tax profits had tripled from £42m to £126m in the 52 weeks to 25 January 2025. Adjusted operating profit at Waitrose was up £122m to £227m.

Despite the strong performance, the partnership confirmed that Waitrose and John Lewis staff will not be rewarded with a bonus – marking the fourth time in five years that employees have missed out on the annual benefit.

Tarry said: “The priority for us at this stage in the transformation is to focus on closing the gap on base pay because when we talk to Partners, what they want to do is make sure that we’re helping them every month, not just once a year, and closing the gap against the market from a base pay perspective.

“The other thing is making sure that we invest in our customers, in our core operation, supply chain and stores, so that we can create sustainable growth and profit growth over the long term.”

While Tarry said the business was “determined to pay a bonus as soon as we possibly can”, he added that this will depend on “where we are at the time and the conditions that we’re facing”.

The comments came during an update today (13 March), which also revealed that John Lewis’ average headcount numbers dropped from 73,000 last year to around 69,000 this year.

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Chief financial officer Andy Mounsey explained this was “through natural attrition and the changes that have been made in the Partnership over the years”.

He said that as the business becomes more efficient, “It’s inevitable and regrettable that we’ll probably need fewer roles in the Partnership.”

“Our focus is ensuring that we’ve got Partners when and where our customers need them most. You’ve seen that through some of the changes we’ve made over the last couple of years in Waitrose and John Lewis, ensuring that we reshape the Partner hours for when our customers want them most.”

However, he added, “Redundancy is always a last resort, and we’ll always aim to manage through natural attrition, turnover first and where that’s not possible, redeploying the Partners”.

In early 2024, the Partnership unveiled plans to cut up to 11,000 jobs over five years as it looked to slash its cost base by £900m.

Mounsey said the Partnership remains “really confident there’s further productivity and growth in our business”. He added that investing £600m in business transformation this year is a “priority” and that it is on track to deliver the £900m of productivity savings by January 2026.