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Waitrose’s shop staff are at risk of losing their jobs if they do not agree to work more flexible hours, as the supermarket chain seeks to boost productivity and keep costs down.
The lossmaking upmarket grocer, which is owned by the John Lewis Partnership, has been losing market share during the cost of living squeeze. It launched a consultation with employees late last month, paving the way for changes to their contracts under a project called Simpler Shops.
Tina Mitchell, retail director at Waitrose, said in a staff video seen by the Financial Times that some employees — known as partners because they jointly own the business — may need to make “sacrifices and compromises” and warned that streamlining operations “may result in some partners leaving the business”.
“Unless we change how we work, there’s a real danger that the partnership won’t exist in the form that we want it to in the future,” she added. Waitrose was striving to have “the right amount of partners doing the right tasks at the right time” as shopping patterns change, including having enough staff on the shop floor during its busiest times, she said.
Waitrose’s market share dropped to 4.4 per cent in the 12 weeks to August from 4.6 per cent a year ago, according to data from Kantar.
Waitrose said: “We want to provide the very best service to our customers . . . to do this, we’re asking some partners across our shops to change their working pattern, and are proposing to cease night shifts at a small number of stores.
“This isn’t something we take lightly and we’ll be supporting our partners through any changes.”
Waitrose told staff it lost £400 a year for every full-time employee, and a third of its hours were “in the wrong place” as it unveiled the plans. The grocer is seeking to unlock 4mn hours of “productivity savings”, or £50mn a year, from changing work patterns.
Waitrose is not part of a workers’ union. In recent years, other retailers such as Asda and Wilko introduced flexible working arrangements and contract changes but also attracted the ire of unions in the process.
In Asda’s case, workers were in effect told in 2019 that in exchange for wage increases, they would have to forgo paid breaks and that working bank holidays would become compulsory. Employers cannot legally change contracts without their staff agreeing to them.
Waitrose’s productivity drive is expected to contribute to a cumulative group savings target of £873mn by January 2026, having already reached £308mn of cost savings in the past two years.
John Lewis Partnership also owns the eponymous department store chain. The group will post half-year results next Thursday after surging inflation and poor consumer sentiment pushed it into an annual pre-tax loss of £234mn last year. It also scrapped its prized bonus for only the second time since 1953.
Dame Sharon White, its chair, has been spearheading a turnaround of the group since she joined in 2020, but she has had to contend with a pandemic, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and surging inflation as well as legacy issues such as overexpansion under her predecessor, Sir Charlie Mayfield.
White previously said she wanted John Lewis and Waitrose to make “sustainable” profit — not maximum profit — which is more aligned with the mutual’s values.
