UK DIY News
Homebase Restructures SSO and Closes Wallington Office
News has reached the Insight DIY offices of a significant restructuring of the Homebase business which took place earlier this week.
The restructuring, which has impact on both their Store Support Office in Milton Keynes and their stores, has resulted in the loss of over 100 roles and the closure of their Wallington office.
It is also understood that the area manager roles have been made redundant and that the store estate of 165 stores will now be managed by 6 divisional business managers (ex' regionals) who will look after around 30 stores each and the store managers will direct report into these.
A spokesperson from Homebase in an exclusive conversation with Insight DIY informed us that “Last month, we let our team know about our intention to reduce the size of our Store Support Centre (head office) team by up to 100 roles. This has been an extremely difficult decision, but a review across all areas of our operations is necessary to ensure we’re set up as simply and sustainably as possible. This decision has not been taken lightly, nor is it a reflection of the brilliant work from those team members affected, all of whom will have our continued full support at this challenging time.”
“We’ve spoken to everyone in the team, whether they have been directly impacted by the change or not, to explain the necessity of this difficult decision. As part of the plan to reduce the size our Store Support Centre team, we have also proposed the closure of our Wallington office. The roles that have been impacted span across all of our support team functions. We are simplifying our regional structure though no store managers have been impacted.”
We've seen a number of ex.employees on LinkedIn this week, sharing their surprise at being made redundant and beginning their search for new roles.
Source: Insight DIY & Homebase.
Insight provides a host of information I need on many of our company’s largest customers. I use this information regularly with my team, both at a local level as well as with our other international operations. It’s extremely useful when sharing market intelligence information with our corporate office.
Don't miss out on all the latest, breaking news from the DIY industry
