Hundreds of jobs will go at Tesco, as the supermarket chain announced a raft of changes in more than 300 stores.
Britain's biggest supermarket will shut deli counters in 317 stores and implement changes to overnight roles and petrol stations in the major shake-up.
Tesco will also ditch its discount store Jack's, which was launched in 2018, and has 13 stores, mainly in the Merseyside, South Yorkshire and Midlands areas.
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The combined changes will put around 1,600 workers at risk, with the vast majority of the job losses coming from changing overnight staffing structures at many shops, according to Tesco.
The retailer plans to remove overnight stocking in 36 large stores and 49 convenience stores and also convert 36 petrol stations to be pay-at-pump only during overnight hours.
No redundancies will be made from the axing of the deli, meat and fish counters, with all affected staff offered alternative roles.
According to Tesco, the counters will remain at 279 stores where there is local customer demand but 317 stores will have the space repurposed to better reflect customers’ needs.
It is not yet known how many stores or jobs are affected in the North East.
The move will see rival Morrisons as the only UK supermarket with widespread staffed deli counters.
The closure of Jack's will result in the loss of 130 jobs at Tesco's head office, in Welwyn Garden City, Hertfordshire.
Six Jack's stores will be converted to Tesco superstores, with the remaining seven to close in the coming months. It is unknown which stores will be saved.
The brand said the changes have been made as customers are 'shopping differently' and as a result of reacting to the challenges of Covid.
Tesco boss Jason Tarry, said: ‘We operate in a highly competitive and fast-paced market and our customers are shopping differently, especially since the start of the pandemic.
‘We are always looking at how we can run our business as simply and efficiently as possible, so that we can re-invest in the things that matter most to customers.
‘The changes we are announcing will help us do this. Our priority now is to support our impacted colleagues through these changes and, wherever possible, find them alternative roles within our business.
“We have learnt a huge amount from Jack’s and this has helped Tesco become more competitive, more efficient and strengthened our value proposition, including through the launch of Aldi Price Match.
"In turn, this has enabled us to consistently attract new customers to Tesco from our competitors over the last two years."
Tesco currently has around 3,000 vacancies across the business.
Tesco launched Jack's - named after Tesco founder Jack Cohen - to much fanfare in 2018 to compete with German discounters Aldi and Lidl
Tesco will continue to provide Jack's branded products to independent convenience stores supplied by its Booker wholesale business.
The chain, which has more than 4,500 stores in the UK, enjoyed a bumper Christmas with industry figures from Kantar recently showing it outperformed its major rivals in the 12 weeks to Boxing Day.
The grocery giant was founded in 1919 by Cohen as a group of market stalls in Hackney, London, and has expanded globally since the early 1990s, with operations in 11 other countries in the world.
