Restructuring events
European Restructuring Monitor (ERM)
The restructuring events database contains factsheets with data on large-scale restructuring events reported in the principal national media and company websites in each EU Member State. This database was created in 2002.
Supermarket chain Carrefour will cut 2,400 jobs through voluntary departure plan targeting the 10,500 Boulogne (Paris) headquarter employees. The distributor plans a streamlining of structures and a reduction of jobs in France. high costs, company's structure and degradation of the financial trajectory have been cited as reasons for the plan. The company is also planning to invest in digitalisation and e-commerce to face Amazon's competition in the food distribution industry. There are no plans to close hypermarkets.
The main three trade unions (FO, CGC and CFTC) at Carrefour criticised the retailer's approach which announced the job cuts thorugh the presse.
In total, Carrefour employs 115,000 people in France.
Update 25/04/2018: On 25 April 2018, the management of the Carrefour distribution group announced that it had reached two agreements with several unions (FO, CGC and CFTC): the first concerns a voluntary redundancy plan involving the 2,400 job cuts at the Group's headquarters out of a total of 10,500 positions (the group employs 115,000 employees in France). The plan is open from 1 July to the end of October 2018. Among the volunteers are many employees at the Boulogne-Billancourt headquarters (Haut-de-Seine), who have no desire to move to the new buildings in Massy-Palaiseau (Essone). The second agreement concerns a job protection plan (PSE) for employees of ex-Dia stores that Carrefour had acquired in 2014, then put up for sale because of their structural loss of revenue and for which no buyers had been found. This plan provides for the suppression of 1,274 positions.
In response to these announcements, about 1,000 employees came to demonstrate on 1 March outside the company's headquarters in Massy-Palaiseau. And on 31 March, nearly 300 Carrefour stores were affected by an employee strike movement to defend jobs and purchasing power.
Eurofound (2018), Carrefour, Internal restructuring in France, factsheet number 97645, European Restructuring Monitor. Dublin, https://apps.eurofound.europa.eu/restructuring-events/detail/97645.