Myer has cut another 90 head office jobs as it looks to adopt “a leaner and more agile business model” in the wake of the shutdown, which is expected to have decimated the department store’s second-half sales.
The jobs that were cut include management, store management, business support, administration and duplicate roles, Myer said on Tuesday.
They make up less than 1 per cent of the retailer’s approximately 10,000-person team, including store staff. Another 45 people in the head office were redeployed to new or redefined roles.
The changes come after Myer already cut 35 executive roles in January, 50 marketing and management roles in March last year and 30 management roles in August 2018.
The retailer announced in March that it would downsize its head office space in Melbourne to a new building that is roughly half the size.
Myer CEO John King has not tried to hide the fact that cost-cutting is a key part of his turnaround strategy for the department store chain, which has suffered declining sales and profit over the past several years amidst increased competition from international brands and the rise of online shopping.
The company had been making progress towards more profitable sales and online growth in FY19, but was impacted by the bushfires and beginnings of the coronavirus crisis in the first half of FY20.
Statutory net profit after tax fell 26.9 per cent to $28.1 million in the half, including restructuring and redundancy costs. Not including these one-off costs or the impact of the AASB16 leasing standard, underlying NPAT rose 0.4 per cent to $41.5 million.
Myer has not provided a trading update since announcing its first-half results, except to report significant online sales growth while stores were shut in April and some of May.
According to Myer’s chief customer officer Geoff Ikin, online sales rose 800 per cent over the Easter long weekend, which eclipsed Black Friday/Cyber Monday in 2019 as the biggest online shopping event in Australia’s history, according to Australia Post.
Off the back of this growth, the company plans to continue investing in its online and supply chain functions going forward.
Myer is providing full support to team members departing the business and thanked them for their contribution. The changes are not expected to impact customer service levels.
After standing down staff in March, Myer said it will bring back all team members to full-time service.
