More than 200 hundred roles are at risk at Morrisons, after the supermarket revealed plans to step up its use of AI in order as part of a cost-cutting drive.
The sweeping job cuts affect all functions at its Hilmore House head office and represent around 8% of all staff.
Affected employees were called into meetings and notified of the restructure on Monday afternoon. The Grocer understands Morrisons has begun consulting with head office staff, with the first consultation meeting set for Friday.
“During 2025 Morrisons commenced a long-term programme to re-engineer certain business functions, to concentrate on the core activities that our customers value, streamline processes and structures, automate a number of manual tasks and capitalise on the potential of data and AI to improve performance,” said a spokesperson for the grocer, confirming news that was first reported by Better Retailing.
“As we evolve and adapt, we are proposing to make some changes to a number of areas within our central structure. This will involve making some tough but necessary decisions which will impact on colleagues in our head office, where we are proposing to place a number of roles at risk of redundancy,” they added.
Morrisons said the multi-year programme would ensure its central functions are ”better placed” to serve stores and will strengthen the its ability to deliver for customers in ”very challenging” market conditions.
The move marks the second round of job cuts at Morrisons in just over a month, after the supermarket put 100 roles at risk in a restructure of the Morrisons Daily commercial and support teams.
This time, roles in commercial, technical, own brand, marketing, HR and supply chain are understood to be included in the latest proposals.
It’s not yet clear exactly which areas of AI Morrisons intends to invest in most heavily, although The Grocer understands the retailer has been increasingly using the technology in supply forecasting. Last September, it also rolled out a new AI-powered category management tool and data platform, More Viu.
Morrisons battling ’unexpected external cost headwinds’
CEO Rami Baitiéh is under pressure to cut costs in order to fuel his turnaround plan and pay down Morrisons £3.1bn debt pile.
During Juanuary’s annual results call, Baitiéh said progress had been slowed by “unexpected external cost headwinds”, pointing to Rachel Reeve’s increases to National Insurance as well as EPR costs.
The economic fallout of the Iran War, alongside the risk of higher interest rates, has added further pressure to the private equity owned supermarket.
“We understand this will be difficult news for these colleagues and will be offering them our full support, including helping them to find alternative roles elsewhere in the business wherever we can,” Morrisons said
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