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J Sainsbury is cutting 3,000 jobs as the UK’s second-largest supermarket chain seeks to reduce costs and simplify its business.
The redundancies, which amount to 2 per cent of the group’s workforce, will result from the closure of its remaining in-store cafés and sweeping changes at management level.
About 20 per cent of senior management roles are expected to be axed, Sainsbury’s said on Thursday.
The decision comes after the company said last year that it would cut £1bn in costs over the next three years.
The reorganisation also comes amid what chief executive Simon Roberts called “a particularly challenging cost environment” as retailers battle rising costs and taxes.
The grocery chain said it was overhauling the structure of its central management teams “to support faster decision making and drive performance” at both Sainsbury’s and Argos, which is also owned by the group.
This would lead to fewer, bigger head office roles with clearer accountability, the company said, adding that the changes would take effect in coming months.
Roberts said the business “had to make tough choices about where we can afford to invest and where we need to do things differently to make our business more efficient and effective”.
