Food
600 Little Chef jobs lost.
Source: Sky news
Ready steady cook caught shoplifting at Tesco.
Antony Worrall Thompson, a celebrity crunch victim back in 2009, is in the news again, for shoplifting.
He was recently caught shoplifting cheese from Tesco.
Related link: Celebrity Crunch Victim Antony Worrall Thompson goes into administration
Source: Sky News
Job losses at Twinings not everyones cup of tea.
Four hundred (400) jobs are to be lost as Associated British Foods plans to close it North Shields packaging plant and move a third of its total production to Poland and China. The rest will go to its other Twinings factory in Andover, Hants.
The Guardian.co.uk reports,
Twinings, which has used Stephen Fry as its advertising frontman, said the changes were ” a necessary step which will allow Twinings to remain competitive” and that it made no sense to import tea from China, package it in the UK and then export it back to the Far East.
The jobs will be lost in the next two years and the reorganisation will cost £19m.
Total losses = 400
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Trouble brews at Twinings as 400 job losses announced
No slow down in the culling of jobs.
Source: Layoff Tracker
Taylor Bean & Whitaker shuts down, 5000 jobs at stake.
Alcoholic drinks manufacturer Altia furloughs 650 (all) employees.
Neste Oil announces 450 layoffs.
University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics cuts 285 jobs.
Katana Summit layoffs 70 workers.
Kindred Healthcare layoffs 573 employees in Florida.
Bobcat Company plans to layoff 100 workers.
Analogic Corp layoffs 85 workers.
Insurance giant Axa Life plans to cut 350 jobs.
IBM Global Business Services Division cuts 200 jobs.
Celanese Corp plans to layoff 100 workers.
GKN Plc to cut 1100 jobs in 12 months.
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel cuts 92 jobs.
Seagate layoffs 2000 workers in Singapore.
PNC Financial Services cuts 74 jobs in Miami.
Mohawk Industries cuts 400 jobs in Georgia.
Patriot Coal to layoff 314 workers.
Ticona Polymers to layoff 100 workers in Cleveland .
KV Pharmaceutical layoffs 300 workers .
Virginia International Terminals layoffs 90 employees.
Rainbows United layoffs 70 employees.
Total losses = 12313
Are KFC a victim of the Credit Crunch?
True Story: I was walking down Baker Street today towards the tube station, when I passed a KFC restaurant and thought of the delicious, 11 herbs and spices chicken burgers they have on offer. Of course once that thought entered my head there was no walking past. So I walked up to the counter half expecting a queue and a £5.50 per hour person ready to (cock up), I mean take my order and then take 10 minutes to get it right and serve it to me, but it didn’t happen becase….
There were no servers or cashiers. Instead there were four self service touch screens lined up from one side of the counter to the other. Wow!!!! Just like at Tescos, ASDA or Sainsburys. The entire menu was on the screen and all one had to do was press the screen and select the food you wanted. Placing an order took about 15 seconds and they even accepted debit card. Once payment was taken, a slip was issued with a number, and the was a slight wait for the food to arrive. Of course the whole process relies on the one or two humans who prepare the food behind the counter. I guess give it a few months and they will be replaced by a robot who can server up the burger and fries in under a minute. So overall the whole experience was incredibly efficient and a real pleasure.
![06082009020[1]](http://www.crunchvictims.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/08/060820090201-1024x768.jpg)
Touch screen self service at Baker Street
Which begs the question, is this form of technology and advancements cheaper to run than a human being? I am guessing the answer is a resounding “YES” at Baker street KFC, but I wonder if it’s come about because of the Credit Crunch and it’s KFC’s way of cutting costs, because in the long run these self service kiosks never stop working, never take breaks, don’t argue, don’t go slow, don’t make money mistakes, don’t need to speak back rudely to the customer, can just work (provided there is electricity) forever. They don’t need training, and can be programmed to change menus quickly and easily. It almost common sense to have them in the restaurants.
For me, getting exactly what I want in a timely fashion under my own instruction is the perfect recipe.
UK Coffee Republic has been placed into administration.
Three main subsidiaries of coffee chain Coffee Republic, Coffee Republic Franchising and Goodbean have been placed into administration after suffering from decreasing consumer spending.
Richard Hill and David Crawshaw of KPMG have been hired as joint administrators. Mr Hill has received a substantial amount of interest, partly from well-known companies. The administrators aim to sell the businesses as going concerns as quickly as possible. Underperforming stores will be shut down and redundancies will be made.
It was only in December that the company announced it had cleared its bank debts of £3.3 million, and was expecting to become cash flow positive by April 2009. Trading in the UK had apparently become stable, though it would be more cautious with its expansion plans. The cafe chain had 184 stores in Britain at the end of last year, 114 of which were concessions, 51 were franchises and the company ran 19.
Coffee Republic was established by brother and sister team Bobby and Sahar Hashemi in 1995. The company failed in its attempt to keep up with now larger competitors such as Starbucks and Costas. Its overly ambitious expansion meant that it has struggled to reach profitability.
The holding company Coffee Republic plc has not been taken into administration.
Source: By Caroline Clayfield
Whataburger closes shops with the loss of 400 jobs.
Whataburger are laying off about 400 people who work in 14 stores in the Tampa Bay, Orlando, Ocala and Gainesville areas, when the stores lock their doors for good at 3 p.m on May 31.
Total losses = 400
Jack in the Box Inc. lays off 64 drivers.
There will be 64 jobs lost at the 4721 Mountain Creek Parkway distribution center in Dallas. The roles are mainly drivers. Jack in the Box is an American fast food restaurant and is cutting the jobs due to the company’s decision to outsource its transportation needs to a third party. Other jobs cut included 4 distribution supervisors and 2 customer-service representatives.
job losses = 64
Affiliated Foods Southwest sack 265 employees.
Affiliated Foods Southwest have laid off half of it workforce of 265 or half of their workforce and the rest will lose their jobs in a month.
Job losses = (265) 530
May day Monday!
It might be a May day holiday in the UK today, but it seems the job loss announcements have not abated.
- London-based advertising company WPP Group Plc will cut a total of 7200 jobs this year, hurt by cuts in client companies’ advertising spending amid the recession. Of the total planned job reductions, about half has already been lost, with the rest expected to go by the end of 2009.
- Software group Sage will announce 1000 job cuts.
- Plumbing giant Wolseley is axing more than 250 jobs at two sites in Lancashire and Oxfordshire. The bulk of the losses will be made at its distribution centre in Chorley with 133 jobs going when the lease on the building expires this August and it is also closing a distribution centre in Didcot with the loss of 76 jobs.
- XFM and Gold radio stations will be losing at least 20 jobs. Redundancies are expected online, in marketing and design departments too.
- Global defence giant BAE Systems announced the loss of 500 jobs and the closure of three sites, partly because of the withdrawal of British troops from Iraq. 50 jobs will go at its Newcastle plant on Scotswood Road, while sites at Telford in Shropshire, Leeds and Guildford in Surrey will close by June next year, with some compulsory redundancies expected.
- Five Pizza Hut restaurants are to close with the loss of around 130 jobs after the company which holds the Northern Ireland franchise went into administration.
- Vestas Wind Systems will slash it’s workforce by 1900. The company that makes wind turbines will make the redundancies mostly in Denmark and the UK, include 450 at it’s factory on the Isle Of Wight.
Drop Celebrity from Antony Worrall Thompson and add Business Fool!
It’s good to see Antony Worrall Thompson in the news again and I am quite surprised he is not making a big hoo haa about his poor business skills. I did a short post on AWT not so long ago (10th February 2009 – Celebrity chef ‘Antony Worrall Thompson’ goes into administration) and he also appears in my CCV (Celebrity Crunch Victims) page.
He was making a big fuss about the banks not lending him more money for his FOUR DOOMED RESTAURANTS. As if they would? Just because he is a so called “celebrity“, he thinks he is special and should get a lot of media attention and help from the banks. At the time I said he must have run his businesses very poorly to have gone into administration.
Well I stumbled upon this intresting article today. It seems his administrators believe he ran his business poorly. Isn’t that interesting?
Read the full article here – How celebrity chef cooked up financial mess?
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Celebrity chef ‘Antony Worrall Thompson’ goes into administration.
Here is a story getting a lot of news today and all because AWT is a “CELEBRITY”, which in layman terms means he is somehow better than you and I.
Forget the fact that four of his restaurants have gone into administration. Why has he got four restuarants in the first place? Why not run two and ensure they are doing well and then open another one or two when the others are firmly grounded? Businesses go into administration for a reason, because they are badly managed, can’t pay the bills, are most likely running at a loss. Dah…
Just because it’s been the cool thing in the past to cook up masses of debt, doesn’t mean it’s right Mr Celebrity. I think AWT has been a bit greedy and now it’s come back to bite him on the arse. Yes the banks have been at fault as well, but 4 wrongs don’t make a right.
AWT said: It makes me cry. It is just appalling. I am furious, to be honest, that the banks didn’t support me.
Stop winging about your losses. Think about those poor staff that you have made redundant. They should be the ones crying.
Job losses = Unknown
Thursday sees some big company names cut jobs.
Estee Lauder Cos., the maker of Clinique and Bobbi Brown cosmetics, will cut 2000 jobs as declines in makeup and perfume sales reduced second-quarter profit.
The job cuts, which represent 6 percent of the workforce, will occur over the next two years.
Starbucks, the company that spread around the world and infected our towns and villages is not immune to the job lay offs it seems. The head office in Seattle handed out roughly 40 pink slips to human resources and security workers. A further 60 people are to go around the countryside. They are the first layoff notices since the coffee company announced plans last week to close 300 stores and eliminate 6700 positions, including 350 at headquarters. The rest of the Seattle layoffs are expected in the next couple weeks.
A kitchen cabinets manufacturer called MasterBrand has laid off about a third of its workers at a plant in Grants Pass, thats 135 people – another victim of the burst housing bubble.
In Ohio, local chemical company Lubrizol Corp. plans to let go of 170 workers in an effort to save money. Lubrizol will cut 50 jobs at its Wickliffe headquarters, 40 jobs in Brecksville and 4 in Avon.
The Wall Street Journal, one of the last major U.S. daily newspapers to avoid deep cuts to its news gathering operations amid a historic industry downturn, is trimming about two dozen (24) newsroom jobs.
Bombardier Inc., the world’s third largest maker of commercial aircraft, plans to cut 1360 jobs at its aerospace unit, or 4.5 percent of the division’s workforce, as business jet deliveries are projected to drop this year. The company will slow production of its Learjet and Challenger planes amid “greater than usual” deferrals and cancellations for its business planes.
820 jobs to be cut at the Dutch food group Vion.
Dutch-owned meat processing group is cutting 820 jobs around the country because of the Economic Downturn. Well that is part of it! They supplied meat products to a lot of the M&S Food Outlets but since M&S are closing these down because they were too expensive and where out of touch when things got tough and a bit slow off the mark (excuse the pun).
Quoted from Sky News
Vion’s plans to restructure the its abattoir and sliced cooked meats operations. The company said it planned to focus resources to create “centres of excellence”.
Vion supplied a lot of it’s products to M&S who recently said they were closing down many Simply Food outlets.
Job losses: 820
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McLeish Brothers go into administration.
Quoted from Tenon Press
The origins of the company stretch back more than 60 years when the McLeish family started a butcher and grocery business in Dundee. Still headquartered in the city, the business was acquired by new owners in 2007, rebranded as McLeish Brothers and launched an ambitious store opening programme across Scotland, which was to be followed by further expansion into England.
Job losses: 175
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