John Lewis hiring again after cutting almost 4,000 jobs
John Lewis plans to create 500 new jobs as it takes control of a massive distribution centre to meet the rise in online sales.
John Lewis has signed an agreement with Tesco to lease a one million sq ft site in Milton Keynes for 11 years.
It said the move reflected “growing customer demand for online orders” via the John Lewis website, as store operations have been disrupted by COVID-19 lockdowns.
Online sales now account for more than 60 per cent of John Lewis’s total sales – up 40% pre-pandemic.
The new warehouse will be operational next year and will be its second-largest distribution centre nationally.
John Lewis has seen its famous staff bonus cancelled and under-performing stores were closed. There have been almost 4,000 John Lewis job losses in just over a year.
However, it is understood hundreds of the roles lost have been saved through redeployments – an update on figures is expected next month.
John Lewis has also confirmed it has signed a three-year lease for a smaller warehouse in Leicestershire that will be in use for Black Friday later this year. But there will be no new jobs at this site as it is operated by a third party.
Andrew Murphy, the partnership’s executive director of operations, said of the new Fenny Lock, Milton Keynes site: “This one-of-a-kind distribution centre represents a fantastic opportunity to power the continued growth of Johnlewis.com, ensuring that we can keep pace with customer demand – both for our products and for our wide range of fulfilment and delivery options.
“We will invest in the site’s automation capability to support future growth and, over the next two years, we will recruit 500 new partners to work at the distribution centre, which we plan to start operating during summer 2022.”
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