Morrisons ‘selling off pharmacies’ as turnaround effort continues

UK supermarket chain Morrisons has begun the sale of its pharmacies as part of its ongoing efforts to manage its large and growing debt burden, the Telegraph has reported.

The paper said that Morrisons has already sold several pharmacies to individual buyers, with executives hopeful that dozens more in-store sites could be sold by early next year.

The sale is reportedly piecemeal, with no collective buyer for the sites.

Some have been acquired by independent pharmacies, while others have been taken over by their existing management. Boots was previously cited as a potential buyer, but has not yet bought any sites, according to the Telegraph.

The move comes after company executives carried out a review that “deemed many to be financially unviable”, the daily added.

It forms part of a wider package of reforms pursued by chief executive Rami Baitiéh to help Morrisons navigate what he has called a “challenging macro environment”. This includes the closure of 100 of its Morrisons Daily convenience stores, which began in July.

In August, the Independent reported that the supermarket cut almost 5,000 jobs in 2025. At the time, a spokesperson for the supermarket told the news site that the job cuts reflect “the impact of the closure of the newspaper home delivery service in convenience, the restructuring of the retail people team and the downsizing of the Rathbones bakery business”.

They added that there was no additional redundancy programme in stores, but numbers were reduced by “not replacing those who chose to leave”.

In a Companies House filing in August, the supermarket revealed that its total debt levels grew from £7.07 billion to £7.52 billion in the year ending October 2025, despite revenues growing 2.8 per cent to £15.7 billion. It also reported a pre-tax loss of £629 million for the year, before exceptional items.



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