Yahoo Finance Just Eat Moves to Eliminate 350 Delivery Jobs in France
(Bloomberg) -- Just Eat Takeway.com NV may eliminate 350 jobs in France due to “difficult market dynamics” in the country, the latest delivery company to announce cuts as the industry grapples with slowing growth.
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The plan, which is still being negotiated with unions, will involve firing permanent delivery staff in 26 cities across France, the Dutch company said in an emailed statement on Wednesday. Just Eat is exploring options in these cities and could outsource its deliveries to other companies, a spokesperson said.
The company is scaling back plans to build up its own logistics network of couriers delivering meals to compete with the likes of Uber Eats and Deliveroo Plc. In its original model, Just Eat matched customers to restaurants and let the eateries deliver themselves. While Chief Executive Officer Jitse Groen in 2020 told analysts that a logistics business couldn’t be profitable in Europe, he has since changed tack, with his firm building up a fleet of couriers.
Industrywide, delivery apps -- which saw huge gains in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic, when they became a lifeline to customers stuck indoors -- are having to find ways to improve their profitability and roll back expansion plans as customer growth trails off.
Rival Deliveroo cut this year’s projections for order growth by more than half on Monday. Fast-delivery startup Gopuff said earlier this month that it would eliminate 10% of its staff and close dozens of warehouses. Germany’s Gorillas Technologies GmbH is exploring options, including the sale of its business or a merger with competitors, people familiar with the talks said in June.
Employees in Just Eat’s French headquarters will also be reduced, and the company will keep permanent delivery staff in Paris only, it said. The proposed cuts are an extension of a first restructuring plan announced in April, which targeted 20 cities in France, and were first reported by newspaper Le Monde on Tuesday.
“Our current priority is to support all affected employees throughout this process,” the company said in the statement. “We remain fully invested in continuing to provide the highest quality of service to our restaurant owners and consumers.”
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