Morrisons, Britain's fourth biggest grocery chain, said its chief executive would step down after the firm posted the worst Christmas performance of the UK's listed supermarkets.
The group which trails Tesco, Asda and Sainsbury's in annual sales, said it had started the search for a new CEO to succeed Dalton Philips who has led the firm for five years.
It said Philips has agreed to continue in his role until the year-end results in March to ensure a smooth transition.
Morrisons also said that chairman designate Andrew Higginson, a former Tesco finance director, would succeed Ian Gibson as chairman on January 22.
The grocer said today that sales at stores open over a year, excluding fuel, fell 3.1% in the six weeks to January 4.
That compares to analysts' average forecast of a fall of 3.8% and marks an improvement on a third quarter decline of 6.3%.
However, comparatives with the previous year were very favourable as Morrisons' same store sales had fallen 5.6% in the Christmas 2013 trading period.
The outcome was also much worse than Tesco's and Sainsbury's Christmas performance.
