Chief executive of Next retailer, Lord Wolfson pocketed more than £4.5m last year after a healthy increase in annual profits at the clothing and household furnishings retailer.
However he has taken the almost unprecedented step for a FTSE 100 boss of sharing with his employees an additional bonus of £2.4m, following a sharp growth in the group’s share price over the last three years.
Lord Wolfson received an annual payout totaling £4.63m for the last financial year, including a salary of £714,000, a separate annual bonus of £1.06m and a further payout of £514,000 under a long-term incentive plan.
The retailer increased its pre-tax profits by 9 per cent to £621.6m over the year to 26 January. That rise was driven by a spectacular performance from its 26-year-old Directory catalogue and online business.
Even so, Lord Wolfson was not the highest paid member on its committee, as group product director, Christos Angelides pocketed a total payout of £5.43m.
That included £1.73m for the retailer’s share matching plan (SMP), in which it hands directors a share for every one they buy.
The main reason for the difference in the two directors’ salary was Lord Wolfson’s decision to hand over the £2.4m additional bonus from the same share-matching plan and give it to long-serving staff members.
Next employs around 19,400 staff, those full-time and part-time staff who have worked at Next over the three years of the SMP will receive around 1 per cent of their salary, as a one-off bonus, with their July pay packet.
In an email to employees, Lord Wolfson said he had “greatly benefited” from the increase in its share price from less than £22 in June 2010 to more than £40. That rise had increased the financial worth of the group by nearly £3bn.
He said: “The exceptional gain in our share price has meant that this award has now become more valuable than I could possibly have expected.”
The Leicestershire group’s shares have increased by 48 per cent over the past year alone as its trading has proved resilient during the difficult High Street conditions.
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