Asda retail and logistics director Ken Towle is to leave the business, only a year after joining the supermarket from Nisa.
Towle, a former Tesco veteran, had been charged by Asda’s owners the Issa brothers with the turnaround of stores. His departure will come as a surprise to many, with Asda having been seen recently to be on an upward curve.
According to Kantar, Asda led the mults in the 12 weeks to Christmas, with sales up by 6.4%, ahead of Sainsbury’s and Tesco.
Towle has also been linked as a potential candidate to take over the top job at Morrisons once another former Tesco executive, David Potts, steps down.
Today, however, Asda said it had been “mutually decided” Towle would leave the business.
Asda also announced the appointment of Aldi’s group director of marketing and communications David Hills as its new chief customer officer.
Hills will be on gardening leave until later in the year, when he will take over from acting chief customer officer Sam Dickson.
Hills joined the discounter in 2007 and held a number of senior commercial roles before taking up his current position in 2013. Prior to joining Aldi, he worked at Kellogg’s in the UK and Australia for nine years.
When Hills joins, Dickson will assume responsibility for strategic Asda and George brand customer propositions, with a focus on improving quality perception.
“I am delighted to welcome David to our business,” said Asda co-owner Mohsin Issa. “Over the past 12 months, Asda has demonstrated its absolute focus on ensuring customers are at the heart of its decision making and as we continue to build our great brand for the future, his expertise will bring a new perspective to our existing strength and breadth of leadership.
“The customer team led by Sam has delivered new customer propositions such as Just Essentials and Dropped & Locked, which show how we are supporting customers during these challenging times. Sam will support David when he joins before transitioning into a new role looking at strategic customer initiatives. I would also like to thank Ken Towle for his contribution to the business and wish him the best for the future.”
Towle spent 30 years with Tesco, where he worked in a variety of roles including stores director and MD for Central Europe, Ireland and Turkey.
His links to the Morrisons job are in part because of his role at Nisa, which some have suggested could help with the conversion of more than 1,000 of its stores to Morrisons Daily convenience stores.
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