After being buoyed by the pandemic, British food delivery platform Deliveroo is now suffering from the economic crisis weighing on demand, announcing on Thursday that it could lay off up to 350 people. “We are starting a layoff process (…) that could see about 9% of the company’s workforce leave, about 350 positions,” announced its founder and CEO, Will Shu, in a message to employees posted on the company website.
The manager specifies that the redistributions within the company could reduce the number of departures to around 300. These job cuts will occur throughout the network, but mainly in the United Kingdom where the company employs a greater number of people, a spokesman saying. They do not refer to distributors, with independent status.
According to him, the company now “faces severe and unforeseen economic headwinds” including “record inflation, rising interest rates, an energy crisis and UK recession fears” weighing on customer demand. .
Withdrawal from the Dutch and Australian markets
Deliveroo recently exited several markets, notably the Netherlands and Australia late last year, “meaning we don’t need the same size workforce to support the needs of our operations,” added Will Shu. These market exits had also resulted in layoffs, notably 120 in Australia. Job cuts announced Thursday add to this, a spokesman said.
The group announced at the end of January that the gross value of transactions, a unit of measurement equivalent to its turnover, had increased by 9% in 2022 (excluding Australia and the Netherlands), but it was still posting a negative operating margin and warned about “uncertain prospects for 2023”. Deliveroo’s share traded around 16:10 GMT on Thursday up 0.22% to 89.12 pence, still well below its April 2021 IPO price of 390 pence.
Source: BFM TV
