CINCINNATI — The Kroger Co., which is headquartered in downtown Cincinnati, is set to lay off nearly 1,000 corporate workers, the company announced Tuesday.
A spokesperson for the company said the layoffs will include only corporate administrative staff. Those working in stores, manufacturing facilities or distribution centers will not be affected.
Of the nearly 1,000 workers laid off, around 200 of them work locally in Cincinnati, the spokesperson said.
In an internal letter to employees, the company said it was looking for ways "to simplify the organization, shift resources closer to our customers and focus on work that creates the most value."
Outside of the layoffs, the company said it also halted projects that weren't helping run great stores.
With the administrative layoffs, Kroger said in the internal letter that it can focus on "lower prices, new store growth and more jobs in stores."
The new round of layoffs at Kroger comes just a few months after the company laid off roughly 200 employees from its downtown Cincinnati-based data analytics unit known as 84.51. In early February, a Kroger spokesperson acknowledged an initial round of roughly 200 job reductions, but it was unclear if the 84.51 layoffs were included in that.
In June, the company also announced that it planned to close 60 stores in the next 18 months.
The company declined to identify which stores will close, but a spokesperson said at the time, “We do not expect any store closures in Cincinnati at this time.”
Kroger has about 2,700 stores nationwide. While closures are announced periodically, they rarely happen in large numbers at one time.
But the company has been cutting back since the surprise resignation of former CEO Rodney McMullen in March, for reasons that have yet to be fully explained. His resignation followed a board investigation into “personal conduct” that a company press release called “inconsistent with Kroger's policy on business ethics.”
