M&S poach clothing guru

Marks and Spencer has poached the former head of clothing at Sainsbury’s Tu, just as she was about to start with rival brand, Asda. M&S have confirmed that Sara Bradley will now take a senior role within its clothing sector. Bradley headed the TU clothing range

and helped propel it to become the 10th largest UK clothing retailer. She had agreed to return to Asda, where she worked before Sainsburys, to head up George.

A Marks & Spencer spokesperson said: "We have offered Sara Bradley a role in our womenswear team as head of buying for M&S Brands and we are delighted that she is now joining us."

It comes as part of the ongoing bid by new M&S chief executive, Marc Bolland, to up the ante with a string of high profile appointments.

A spokesperson has revealed that Bradley was literally weeks away from joining the George division of Asda to enhance performance in its already leading men’s clothing and childrenswear divisions. Industry insiders will be taking note of the sudden move – a sign of Bolland’s serious ambitions to boost M&S’s waning position.

And it looks set to continue as M&S seem to be feeding Bolland endless resource to make sure they can secure the most high profile people.

Other recent additions to the team include Laura Wade Gery, a former chief executive at Tesco online to head up M&S ecommerce and Jan Heere from global retailer, Inditex, to lead international expansion.

Meanwhile competition is rife as rumours have it that Morrisons have been in talks with George founder, George Davies, to start up a clothing line. And Sainsburys have announced they now have Gok Wan designing a line, which will out later this year.

Images: Marks and Spencer