How will Coles $1b cost-cutting affect you?
Coles has announce it will cut $1 billion in costs in the next four years, through increased technology and automation – and cutting jobs.
The New Daily reports that retailer claims the cost-cutting exercise will help it be more competitive with discount grocery market that will soon feature German chains Lidl and Kaufland.
Coles chief Steven Cain said the prospect of increasing competition meant the supermarket giant faced the toughest five years in its history.
Even maintaining market share would be an achievement, he said, as discount supermarkets grow in Australia, and online grocery sales continue to outstrip bricks and mortar stores.
“The outlook for traditional bricks and mortar supermarkets is sales densities could decline in the medium term if action isn’t taken,” said Mr Cain.
Coles’ also announced that 450 jobs will be cut and that “further reductions in manual operations” throughout stores and supply chain are to be expected along with the closure of “unprofitable” stores.
Do you happily use automated checkouts? Will seeing more automation in your store be good for you, or annoying?
For a large shop I prefer the manned cash registers, and it is nice to be able to talk to the cashier. If the queues are long and I have only 2 or 3 items (very rarely) I can use the automatic system. Have yet to hear a machine say "Good morning, how are you today" and I don't say "Have a good day" to the machine.