Who owns Morrisons? US private equity firm CD&R

An American private equity firm: Clayton, Dubilier & Rice, usually shortened to CD&R, which bought Morrisons in October 2021 after a bidding war, in a deal worth about £7 billion for the shares and roughly £10 billion once debt was included. The supermarket your grandparents knew as a Bradford family firm has been owned from New York for five years.

Of every entry in this series, this is the one where the ownership change shows up most visibly in the numbers, so this page leans on them.

What actually happened in 2021?

A takeover battle. Two US investment groups, Fortress and CD&R, spent the summer of 2021 outbidding each other for Morrisons, and it ended in a formal auction run by the Takeover Panel, which CD&R won. Shareholders were paid and the company left the London Stock Exchange after more than fifty years as a listed business.

The mechanics matter, because this was a leveraged buyout: a large part of the purchase price was borrowed, and the borrowing sits on Morrisons. Before the takeover, Morrisons carried around £3.2 billion of net debt. The latest accounts of its ultimate parent, Market Topco Limited, put net debt at £7,516 million on 26 October 2025, up from £7,073 million a year earlier. That figure is made up of £3,869 million of borrowings, £2,009 million of preference shares, £1,969 million of lease liabilities and £42 million of derivatives, less £373 million of cash. The preference shares sit inside the £7.5 billion, not on top of it. The business press describes them as carrying a fixed return payable to CD&R, and Morrisons’ own earlier accounts say some of its managers were invited to invest in them too, so part of what the business owes is owed to the people who own it.

To pay debt down, assets have been sold. The best-known example: in 2024 Morrisons sold its petrol forecourts for up to £2.5 billion to Motor Fuel Group, which is also owned by CD&R, meaning the same firm sat on both sides of the transaction. Seven distribution warehouses were sold and leased back for £220 million in 2022, and 76 stores for £331 million in 2024. Morrisons points out, fairly, that more than 80% of its supermarkets are still owned freehold and that revenue is growing again: £15,752 million excluding fuel in the year to October 2025, up from £15,382 million. What the accounts do not support is the idea that the losses are mostly writedowns. The loss before tax was £926 million. Take out the one-off items, £267 million of them impairments, and the business still lost £629 million, because £676 million went on finance costs, most of it the cost of the debt described above.

Wasn’t Morrisons a family firm?

For most of its life, and more genuinely than almost any big retailer. William Morrison started as an egg and butter merchant in Bradford in 1899. His son Sir Ken Morrison built the supermarket chain from the 1950s onward, floated it in 1967, ran it for decades, and took it national with the takeover of Safeway in 2004. Ken died in 2017, and the family era ended in practice long before the 2021 sale. The Bradford headquarters remains; the ownership does not.

How did Morrisons end up like this?

1899. William Morrison starts an egg and butter business in Bradford.

1950s to 1967. Ken Morrison builds the supermarkets and floats the company on the stock exchange.

2004. Morrisons buys Safeway and becomes a national big-four grocer.

2017. Sir Ken Morrison dies.

2021. Fortress and CD&R fight a summer-long bidding war; CD&R wins the auction and takes Morrisons private in a roughly £10 billion leveraged buyout.

2022. Morrisons buys the McColl’s convenience chain out of administration; much of it is later written down and partly closed.

2024. The petrol forecourts are sold for up to £2.5 billion to Motor Fuel Group, CD&R’s other British business.

2026. Lidl overtakes Morrisons in May to become Britain’s fifth-largest supermarket, leaving Morrisons sixth. The parent company’s accounts, filed in August, show net debt of £7,516 million and a £926 million loss before tax, under chief executive Rami Baitiéh, who joined in 2023.

So is Morrisons independent?

No, on every axis at once: a national chain, formerly listed, now owned by a US private equity firm. Under our definition it was never going to qualify, but Morrisons is in this series because it’s the cleanest example of what private equity ownership means in practice on a British high street: money borrowed to buy the business becomes the business’s own debt, assets get sold to service it, and a slice of what you spend at the till works its way toward New York. None of that is illegal or even unusual. It’s just invisible at the checkout, and we think you should be able to see it.

The butcher, greengrocer and baker that Morrisons’ own market-street branding pays tribute to still exist in most towns, owned by the people behind the counter. Finding them is a different search, and it’s the one we’re built for.

Last verified 10 September 2026. Debt, revenue and loss figures are read from Market Topco Limited’s group accounts for the 52 weeks to 26 October 2025 (company 13537349), filed at Companies House on 12 August 2026. Market share is from Worldpanel by Numerator data reported on 27 May 2026; the takeover, forecourt and property figures are from contemporary business press.