The Morrisons branding will be dropped this year

The CI Traders group includes Le Riche supermarkets and the Marks & Spencer franchise in Jersey, as well as other businesses in the UK and France.

It is the islands' largest private sector employer. All 400 local staff have been told their jobs are safe.

Tom Scott, the executive chairman, says the group's many shops will operate in competition with each other.

Dinner deal

It is due to drop the Morrisons branding this year and 15 UK employees in managerial roles will work for CI Traders until other jobs are found with Morrisons either in the UK or the Channel Islands.

The sale was made the day before new rules on mergers come into force.

But Mr Scott says the new competition law, which could rule on whether certain firms are too dominant, may not have affected the sale.

He said: "Obviously it was more convenient to be done before then, but we would have to study the law because it's still very hazy to see what effects it would have had on it.

"It's not a coincidence, it's just how it happened in actual fact. Ted Morrison came over to the islands to have a look at his stores and we met him and had dinner with him and a deal was struck from there."