Is a new chief executive the answer for Morrisons?

Morrisons chief executive Dalton Philips is to stand down after five years in charge of the supermarket chain. Credit: ITV

"Time for a fresh pair of eyes and a fresh look" - that's the view of Morrisons' incoming Chairman, Andrew Higginson, and so Dalton Philips is on his way.

In a sense it's no surprise. Christmas was poor, sales were worse than last year, which was terrible.

Shareholders were already fractious. Last summer the former Chairman, Sir Ken Morrison, publicly denounced the company's turnaround plan as "bulls**t" at Morrisons' annual general meeting.

Morrisons' share price has risen this morning but before judging Philips time as chief executive too harshly, recall the state of the business five years ago when he was appointed.

An inadequate IT system, no convenience stores, no online business, no smart loyalty scheme. Philips' inherited an unbalanced trolley with wheels that had worked loose.

There was the odd howler (Kiddicare) but generally speaking Dalton Philips set about energetically addressing all of the above. As he did so, the economics of the industry suddenly changed.

None of the big, established supermarkets spotted the rise of the discounters until they'd scaled the gates but Philips was the first to state publicly the significance of what was taking place.

Philips' view is that Aldi and Lidl have done to retail what Ryanair and Easyjet did to aviation. His response was to cut prices and take on the chin the loss on the value of the Morrisons property portfolio (something Tesco has yet to do).

This morning, like Tesco, Morrisons has announced it will close 10 of its 500 stores which it believes can't be made profitable again. 400 jobs will go.

"Match and More" was Morrisons attempt to take the fight to the discounters. It sounded bold, it clearly hasn't succeeded as hoped. The supermarket shifted the same amount of groceries as last year, just at a lower price.

The logic of Philips' plan was perfectly sound and just because it hasn't worked yet doesn't mean it won't. It will be interesting to see what a "fresh pair of eyes" will bring to the party.