Amazon to Shutter Three UK Warehouses

Amazon will close three of its U.K. warehouses in favor of newer fulfillment centers.

The company said Tuesday (Jan. 10) the closures will affect warehouses in Hemel Hempstead, Doncaster and Gourock, and impact 1,200 workers, who will be offered the chance to transfer to other facilities.

“We’re always evaluating our network to make sure it fits our business needs and to improve the experience for our employees and customers,” a company spokesperson told PYMNTS. “As part of that effort, we may close older sites, enhance existing facilities, or open new sites, and we’ve launched a consultation on the proposed closure of three fulfillment centers in 2023.”

Amazon also plans to open two newer fulfillment centers in the U.K., the spokesperson said, employing 2,500 workers.

The news comes days after the company said it planned to cut more than 18,000 jobs, a figure that includes the layoffs made last year.

In a message to employees last week, CEO Andy Jassy restated points he had made in November: the economy is uncertain; Amazon had hired rapidly for several years; and company leaders are participating in the annual planning process and prioritizing the things that matter most to customers and the business’s long-term health.

Amazon added hundreds of thousands of workers during the pandemic as eCommerce spending skyrocketed. As of September of last year, the company employed 1.5 million people, most of them warehouse employees.

In December, Jassy told an audience at The New York Times’ Dealbook conference that Amazon was forced to make decisions to try to meet a rise in demand early in the pandemic and to “go much faster” than it ever anticipated.

“We built a physical fulfillment center footprint over 25 years that we doubled in 24 months,” Jassy said, acknowledging that Amazon recognized that it could be overbuilding but proceeded with its plans nonetheless. “It was hard for us to imagine what ’21 was going to be like, let alone ’22, but we decided that we were going to shade on the side of consumers and sellers who didn’t want to be constrained.”

For all PYMNTS retail and EMEA coverage, subscribe to the daily Retail and EMEA Newsletters.