Tesco squeezes store managers as food price inflation soars

Some 1,750 roles are at risk as Tesco restructures its operation with a new tier of lower-paid ‘shift leaders’ just a week after Asda moved night workers onto lower-paying day roles, writes James Moore

In store managers at Tesco feeling chill as prices rise (REUTERS)

There’s trouble at the Tesco mill. Britain’s biggest supermarket has just announced “store changes helping us to remain competitive”.

Are we ever going to see a straightforward announcement? Something like: store restructuring puts 1,750 jobs at risk. This would be appropriately corporate while putting the real story front and centre. Still, to those of us who’ve been reading press releases for a while, the words “changes” and “competitive” spell “trouble” and “bad news for workers”.

The story here is that Tesco is shaking up its store management roles to save money. This will involve the creation of a new tier of “shift managers” with a corresponding reduction in “lead” and “team” managers.