MARKS & Spencer is set to launch a food delivery service for the first time ever, after it agreed a deal with online supermarket Ocado.
The new partnership will begin next year after Ocado’s current deal with Waitrose expires.
It will see Ocado supply more than 4,500 M&S products as part of the 50,000-strong range of goods that it currently offers, which include own label and branded products.
M&S will pay £750m for a 50% share of Ocado’s retail business, which will be paid for by cutting its dividend payout to shareholders and selling £600m of shares.
M&S chief executive Steve Rowe, said the deal was part of a wider strategy to become “a truly digital first retailer” with at least a third of M&S’s business online.
