Prospect of closure looms over Asda’s Enfield Home Shopping Centre
UK supermarket Asda confirmed yesterday (17 July) that it is entering into consultation with staff at its Enfield Home Shopping Centre in north London over proposals to close the facility.
The site, which opened in 2010, employs more than 260 staff and delivers home shopping to 4,500 customers each week.
In its statement about the proposed closure, Asda said: “The proposal comes after the retailer invested significantly in its digital capabilities and opened two brand new fully automated Home Shopping Centres in London over the last 18 months – one in Heston in July 2017 and one in Dartford two months ago. These sites have created over 700 new jobs and provide increased capacity, improved accuracy and faster fulfilment to meet customer demand.”
The supermarket reported its Grocery Home Shopping business grew by 8.3% last quarter – so the proposed closure is not so much a reflection of the company’s confidence in the home delivery model, but its concerns over the Enfield location.
Simon Gregg, Vice President of Grocery Home Shopping at Asda said: “Despite great efforts by our colleagues at Enfield, restrictions on the site mean we are not able to make the necessary further improvements to meet the speed of fulfilment and product ranges that our customers now expect. Therefore, we’ve entered a consultation process with colleagues on proposals to close the facility.
“Our current proposals involve expanding capacity in our Heston centre and discussing options for colleagues to take on roles in other neighbouring stores. Whilst conversations about change are never easy, we would always work to find new opportunities for impacted colleagues, with redundancy as a last resort.”
