Sainsbury’s and Asda in talks to merge

[Fusion]

They've said there will be no job cuts, so store closures shouldn't be happening.

There may not be any immediate job losses. But there are ways round these things, such as not replacing people who leave, cutting overtime down, adjusting bonuses, Sunday/Bank Holiday pay, breaks, shift patterns, you name it.

Supermarkets are experts at minimising outlay on staff.

 

[Jimbeam3678]

As I said early anyone who thinks there will not be job losses is very very naive! Sainsburys at Jacksons anyone....

 

[stoofa]

The biggest saving will be in supplier alignment.
You take each item Sainsbury's and Asda buy. Who is getting the best price? Now both stores buy from that supplier.
There will be some massive savings there alone.

 

[FortuitousFluke]

The biggest saving will be in supplier alignment.
You take each item Sainsbury's and Asda buy. Who is getting the best price? Now both stores buy from that supplier.
There will be some massive savings there alone.

It'll be somewhat more aggressive than that. More along the lines of:

You take each item that Sainsbury and Asda buy, you combine the demand, you use colossal buying power to leverage a price that is lower that the price originally paid by either company individually. Works even better if you're already both buying from the same supplier as if you're willing to walk away from the table then you either cause a massive dent in the supplier's balance sheet or potentially wipe them out all together.

That's one of the big reasons the CMA will be going over this deal with a fine tooth comb.

 

[Skiddley]

As I said early anyone who thinks there will not be job losses is very very naive! Sainsburys at Jacksons anyone....

I agree. The media only talk about store closures not happening because that's most people's perception of the businesses. What about all of the back-office staff. Cull.

 

[V F]

It's a completely different scenario though. There was obviously enough demand for both an ASDA and Sainsburys in these places where they are nearby otherwise one would have already closed down. The customers of one of the two shops aren't just going to disappear into thin air when the merger happens!

How? When has any big company buyout lead to no job losses? Cabury's layoffs didn't happen over night. It happened over months but it still happened.

 

[Rroff]

How? When has any big company buyout lead to no job losses? Cabury's layoffs didn't happen over night. It happened over months but it still happened.

AFAIK Sainsbury's acquisition of Argos has had few if any job losses though I'm not really sure what has happened where they've closed high street stores and moved them into nearby Sainsbury's stores - its likely a certain number of those staff probably won't be replaced when they do leave as I'd imagine the number of staff needed will be reduced and likewise have a knock on effect for things like cleaning staff (assuming external contractor) where they won't need the services that used to be done on the old Argos building.

 

[LeeUK]

Tesco stores in the world is 7000.
Tesco stores in the uk is roughly 3700

Asda stores in the uk 631

Sainsburys stores in the uk 1411

Didnt realize tesco had so many stores to be honest.

A lot of those Tescos are just small Express/Metro stores, same goes for Sainsburys. Where as Asda they are all full size supermarkets apart from the few Netto stores they took over but they are still small supermarket size - a lot bigger than a Tesco Express.

 

[Spook187]

Very rarely shop at both of these, always found them below par for my liking.

Marks and Spencer plus Booths is where its at.

 

[ozaudio]

There may not be any immediate job losses. But there are ways round these things, such as not replacing people who leave, cutting overtime down, adjusting bonuses, Sunday/Bank Holiday pay, breaks, shift patterns, you name it.

Supermarkets are experts at minimising outlay on staff.

sainsburys...

not taken anybody on since 2012 in the depot I work, agency only since 2012.
overtime only on when really needed.
bonus is based on how much work you do so if they remove this, good luck getting enough out of warehouse.
bank hol pay is x2.6 or 1.6x and a lieu day so could do something with this if they wanted
we have 3 x paid brakes in an 8hour shift and they have mentioned before in pay rise talks about removing one of the 10min brakes
nights does get a small shift allowance, don't think this will be removed as its only £1.68 an hour or something between 6pm/6am

 

[Rroff]

nights does get a small shift allowance, don't think this will be removed as its only £1.68 an hour or something between 6pm/6am

Not many people will do night work without something to make up for it - cutting an enhanced rate for night work will properly demoralise and result in a huge hit to quality and productivity of work done.

 

[ozaudio]

yup I agree, the sick pay we have is good, but its abused far to much.. same people year in year out. 10 weeks full then 10 weeks half pay or something like that. union is always sticking up for them aswell, funny enough the same sick abusers are also the dead legs of the warehouse, we'd have gotten far better pay rises if it wasn't for the useless idiots we have.

bonus is based on how quick you complete a job.

example...
30 minute job completed it 30 mins is 100% , bonus is paid from 90% upto 105% . yet you see some lazy people on just 60-65%. I work at around 120-130% most nights so after the 105% im giving " free " effort I don't even need to put in, but im not lazy and passes the night quicker

 

[Rroff]

example...
30 minute job completed it 30 mins is 100% , bonus is paid from 90% upto 105% . yet you see some lazy people on just 60-65%. I work at around 120-130% most nights so after the 105% im giving " free " effort I don't even need to put in, but im not lazy and passes the night quicker

Funny thing I find is the lazy ones always see everyone else as lazier than themselves and that if someone is performing better they think they've just found a way to fiddle the numbers, etc.

 

[Glaucus]

30 minute job completed it 30 mins is 100% , bonus is paid from 90% upto 105% . yet you see some lazy people on just 60-65%. I work at around 120-130% most nights so after the 105% im giving " free " effort I don't even need to put in, but im not lazy and passes the night quicker

sod that Safeway used to have similar way back in the day. I used to get to max bonus then go have some extended breaks, dotted throughout the shift, they didn't like you having breaks for hours at a time.

 

[Em3bbs]

How? When has any big company buyout lead to no job losses? Cabury's layoffs didn't happen over night. It happened over months but it still happened.

Sorry, I was more talking about store closures and quoted the wrong post. Of course there will be job losses and office closures where there is duplication, but when it comes to stores and branding there is obviously enough room, and if not then stores will close down when they become unprofitable - as they already do no matter who owns them or the sign on the front.

 

[Steampunk]

Sorry, I was more talking about store closures and quoted the wrong post. Of course there will be job losses and office closures where there is duplication, but when it comes to stores and branding there is obviously enough room, and if not then stores will close down when they become unprofitable - as they already do no matter who owns them or the sign on the front.

But even if each of an Asda and a Sainsburys are profitable whilst being next door to each other, you can cut costs by closing one of those stores (thus improving profits), and having all your customers go to the one location. Why pay for two shops and two sets of staff, when you can get rid of one shop? Your customers are most likely going to have to go to the existing store because that's the only one that's left in the locale.

 

[Lopéz]

1+1 has to equal more than 2, so there will doubtless be some form of overall job reduction at some point, even if it isn't immediate redundancies in the normal sense of the word.

 

[ozaudio]

Funny thing I find is the lazy ones always see everyone else as lazier than themselves and that if someone is performing better they think they've just found a way to fiddle the numbers, etc.

clearly you've worked in this sort of place before haha, that's exactly what happens..

 

[johnny6]

But even if each of an Asda and a Sainsburys are profitable whilst being next door to each other, you can cut costs by closing one of those stores (thus improving profits), and having all your customers go to the one location. Why pay for two shops and two sets of staff, when you can get rid of one shop? Your customers are most likely going to have to go to the existing store because that's the only one that's left in the locale.

Depends where I live within about a 10 minute drive we have 3 medium to large Sainsbury’s, 2 medium to large Tesco’s, 1 large Asda and a reasonable size M&S food place. That’s not even counting all of the smaller Tesco metro smaller stores.

If Sainsbury closed up shop tomorrow I wouldn’t automatically move my shop to Asda. It would probably drive me to shop at Tesco’s more. So closing down one ‘brand’ (as there is another one close by within the group) wouldn’t see them retaining all their current customer base.

So closing down a store might not happen if the loss of customer spend outweighs the operating costs of running an additional location. It could be more profitable to retain all of the locations.

 

[Hotwired]

I'm still in favour of the idea of using the Asda brand to compete at the discount end so it makes better use of having duplicate supermarkets with similar catchment areas.