JD Sports hires Morrisons’ Andy Higginson as chair

JD Sports, the sportswear group reeling from last month’s ousting of its longstanding chair Peter Cowgill, has appointed former Wm Morrison chair Andy Higginson to lead its board.

Higginson spent a large part of his career in various roles at Tesco but left early during Phil Clarke’s tenure as chief executive of the supermarket chain. He became chair at Morrisons in 2015 and swiftly recruited former Tesco colleague David Potts as chief executive.

He is also a senior non-executive at gaming group Flutter and was previously a non-executive at broadcaster Sky and mail order group N Brown. He was also briefly chair of Ardonagh, a privately owned group of insurance brands.

Helen Ashton, who has been running the board at JD Sports since Cowgill left, said Higginson “stood out as the best candidate with his extensive board experience, including as a chair, and his strong record in the international retail sector”.

Cowgill’s ejection, despite his stellar record over almost two decades in charge, was precipitated by disagreements over splitting his executive chair role into a more conventional structure with a non-executive chair and full-time chief executive.

It followed a series of disputes with regulators that had raised concerns about internal controls, risk management and legal compliance. JD’s most recent results statement stated that “a number of regulatory issues” had highlighted a need for more board-level experience.

Cowgill clashed with the competition regulator over its decision to retrospectively block JD’s takeover in 2019 of Footasylum, a smaller rival. This year, JD was fined almost £5mn for discussing commercially sensitive information with Footasylum.

At Morrisons, Higginson worked with chief financial officer Trevor Strain to restore the grocer’s balance sheet and reset its strategy, a process that culminated in the chain’s £10bn sale to US private equity group Clayton, Dubilier and Rice last autumn.

However his tenure there was not without controversy. In 2020, two non-executives quit the board partly because they felt Higginson was insufficiently independent of the senior executive team. Higginson dismissed the claims, but there was a minor investor rebellion against his re-election the same year.

In a statement on Friday, Higginson said JD was “an exceptional business” that was “addressing its governance and risk management structure”, adding that he was looking forward to working with its board. He will take up the new role on Monday.

JD is still looking for a permanent chief executive to replace Kath Smith, the former Adidas and North Face executive who has run the company since Cowgill left. It also needs to find a buyer for Footasylum.