Holbeach, Bourne and Market Deeping: Tesco announces plans to cut 1,800 jobs in bakery revamp
Supermarket giant Tesco has announced that it is reviewing its bakery operation which has put 1,816 people at risk of redundancy.
The chain says it will be making a number of changes as customers are no longer buying traditional loaves and are opting for wraps, bagels and flatbreads instead.
Tesco, which has stores in Holbeach, Bourne and Market Deeping, will be introducing the changes in May.
A statement from the firm says: "We will continue to offer scratch baking in 257 stores but we’re making some changes to our other bakeries. In 201 stores the most popular products will continue to be baked from scratch with other products moving to part-baked. And in 58 stores we’re converting the bakery to full bake-off where all products are delivered pre-prepared, then baked and finished in store."
It adds that it will be investing in up-to-date fixtures as well as growing regional bakery ranges with small local producers.
The statement adds: "Due to some stores doing less scratch baking, as well as the simplified routines these changes will bring, we will unfortunately need fewer colleagues to work in these areas. As a result, there are 1,816 bakery colleagues being put at risk of redundancy. At this difficult time, our priority will be to support those colleagues impacted, including finding an alternative role from the many thousands of vacancies we will have available across our store networks between now and May, for those who wish to stay with us. "
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Jason Tarry, UK & ROI CEO, said: “We need to adapt to changing customer demand and tastes for bakery products so that we continue to offer customers a market-leading bakery range in store. We know this will be very difficult for colleagues who are impacted, and our priority is to support them through this process. We hope that many will choose to stay with us in alternative roles.”
