More than 300 jobs at risk as Morrisons closes cafés and counters

Morrisons has announced it will close cafés, meat and fish counters, and convenience stores to help mitigate recent significant cost increases. 

The supermarket, which was overtaken by Aldi as the UK’s fourth largest in 2022, said it is making changes to its stores and operations to accelerate growth.

A wide-ranging review identified a number of areas where the “costs of operations are significantly out of line with usage, volumes or the value that customers place on them”.

As a result, Morrisons is proposing a number of changes over the coming months, that will see the closure of 52 cafés, all 18 market kitchens, 17 convenience stores, 13 florists, 35 meat counters, 35 fish counters and four pharmacies.

Around 365 staff will be at risk of redundancy, although the “significant majority” of these employees are expected to be deployed in suitable roles elsewhere in Morrisons. Morrisons employs around 118,000 people in the UK.

Rami Baitiéh, chief executive of Morrisons, said: “The changes we are announcing today are a necessary part of our plans to renew and reinvigorate Morrisons and enable us to focus our investment into the areas that customers really value and that can play a full part in our growth.”

He said that Morrisons’ cafés are famous for their great quality, well-priced food, their place in the local community and their appealing mix of traditional favourites alongside exciting new dishes. In most stores, the cafés have a “bright future”, but a minority have specific local challenges and closure and re-allocation of the space is the only sensible option.

In some stores where the private-equity-owned retailer is closing counters or cafés, it plans to work with third parties to provide a relevant specialist offer.

Baitiéh added: “Although these changes are relatively small in the context of the overall scale of the Morrisons business, we do not take lightly the disruption and uncertainty they will cause to some of our colleagues.

“We will of course take particular care to look after all of them well through the coming changes.”

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