Sainsbury’s puts 2,000 jobs at risk as it rolls out food hall formats
Sainsbury’s will close 200 of its in-store cafes, putting 2,000 roles at risk, as it looks to roll out more of its Restaurant Hub food hall formats.
The grocer said it would close 200 in-store cafes by the spring, putting some 2,000 roles at risk of redundancy.
Sainsbury’s also said it would close “less popular” hot-food counters in 34 of its stores and “simplify the way it runs” bakeries in a further 54 stores.
The move follows a trial of a new “food hall” format called The Restaurant Hub at its Selly Oak store in Birmingham.
Off the back of the trial, Sainsbury’s plans to open 30 more of the food halls in 2022, as well as 30 Starbucks coffee shops in its supermarkets over the next 12 months.
It is currently working in partnership with the Boparan Restaurant Group on the project. As part of the trial, customers were able to choose options from the likes of Gourmet Burger Kitchen, Ed’s Diner and Slim Chickens.
Sainsbury’s said it could increase the number of food halls in future years, if they continued to perform well with customers.
The remaining 67 cafes will remain open while Sainsbury’s reviews roll-out plans.
In a statement, the supermarket said it had spoken to all of its cafe workers today about the closure plans.
It also said that it would “simplify the way it runs its bakeries” in 54 stores and hold talks with those workers and those on the hot food counters, with the aim of redeploying them in other departments in-store if possible.
The retailer has already closed its fresh fish, cheese and meat counters in stores, which saw about 3,500 jobs cut.
