The Upper Crust Set to Axe Around 5,000 UK Jobs

The Upper Crust owner SSP Group is expected to announce plans to make more than half of its workforce redundant on Wednesday.

THE bakery and catering company which served around 1.5 million customers daily in around 35 countries across 180 airports and 300 rail stations before the pandemic hit, will axe up to 5,000 of around 9,000 UK jobs. According to information obtained by Sky News, a message being circulated among staff on Tuesday, said the company had “come to the very difficult conclusion that we will need to simplify and reshape our business and, from tomorrow, we will be starting a collective consultation on a number of proposed changes to the business. This includes a proposed reorganisation which could lead to a headcount reduction of up to c.5,000 across SSP Group, SSP Finance and SSP UK, which includes all head office colleagues and both salaries and hourly paid colleagues in operations.”

The board is reported to have taken around 30% pay cuts until at least September, as well as “twice raised money from shareholders during the pandemic to shore up its balance sheet”.