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The John Lewis Partnership

The John Lewis Partnership is one of the UK’s top ten retail businesses with 28 John Lewis full line department stores, one smaller scale John Lewis At Home and 219 Waitrose supermarkets plus 4 Waitrose convenience stores.

It is also the country’s largest employee co-operative, with 72,000 employees. The Partnership aims to ensure that everyone who works for it enjoys the experience of ownership, by sharing in the profits, by having access to information and by sharing in decision making.

The Partnership believes that the commitment of Partners to the business is a unique source of competitive advantage which has underpinned over 80 years of growth and a reputation amongst customers and suppliers unparalleled in the UK retail industry.

The company’s record of performance testifies to the robustness of the vision of its founder, John Spedan Lewis, to create a company dedicated to the happiness of the staff through their worthwhile and satisfying employment in a successful business.

John Lewis Partnership plc and its subsidiary John Lewis plc have small issues of preference stock which have first claim on the profits. The whole of the remaining profit is available to be used for the benefit of the business and the Partners. The share of profits allocated to Partners, the Partnership bonus, is fixed each year by the Partnership Board and is distributed as the same percentage of gross annual pay for all Partners. All Partners received a 15% bonus for 2009/10 as their share of profits at a total cost of £151m.