More than 500 warehouse jobs are being cut at fashion chain New Look under plans to axe the night shift at its site in Staffordshire. The move to switch to a day shift only will impact 503 of its 1,200 workers at the group’s warehouse in Lymedale Business Park site, Newcastle-under-Lyme.
But New Look is hoping to be able to re-employ some of those employees affected as it hires an extra 300 staff on the expanded day shift. It marks the latest in a raft of job losses across the retail sector, with it emerging on Wednesday that discount chain Wilko is axing jobs, with more than 400 roles reportedly facing the axe, including assistant store managers, retail supervisors, head office managers and call centre workers.
Supermarkets Tesco and Asda have also been among those cutting jobs as a sector-wide cull picks up pace in the face of soaring costs. A New Look spokesman said: “With this shift, it has become increasingly clear that the processes at the distribution centre no longer suit our operational needs.
“Therefore, we are proposing a necessary change to working hours in the distribution centre, including the removal of the night shift. Regrettably, we expect this will result in a number of redundancies at the site. We are focusing on supporting our affected colleagues at this time and we expect to be able to offer a considerable number of these individuals new roles on the day shift.”
The group is currently in consultation with staff, with redundancies not set to take effect until mid-May. New Look also recently revealed it is shutting around seven stores, although it said this was part of normal business, with two also being opened before Christmas.
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Wilko said on its overhaul that the efforts come as part of a turnaround programme to “drive Wilko forward”. Mark Jackson, chief executive at Wilko, said: “As part of this we quickly identified significant changes to the Wilko operating model to enable us to stabilise the business, and then thrive again.
“This includes some planned and considered changes to our management structure at both our stores and head office. We can’t comment on the numbers of team members affected as conversations are still ongoing, but it goes without saying, we’re fully supporting any affected individuals.”
Wilko – which has 16,000 employees and more than 400 stores – swung to a £36.8 million loss in the year to January 2022 as it was knocked by soaring costs and supply chain disruption.
