Recipe box maker Gousto has put 290 jobs at risk as part of its plans to close a warehouse in Lincolnshire.
The company, which delivers food boxes for people to cook meals at home, said it is closing its Lincolnshire base in a bid to keep prices down in a competitive market.
Gousto, a rival to other meal kit providers like Hello Fresh and Mindful Chef, currently runs its production in both its Clay Lake site in Lincolnshire and its site in Warrington, Cheshire.
The new proposal means all manufacturing would take place at its Warrington warehouse.
The Warrington site has benefited from heavy investment and uses advanced technology, like automation, to expand their offer of recipes and personalisation of customers orders.
Redundancies ‘incredibly difficult’
The facility also prepares approximately 140m meal kits each year with a team of around 600 staff.
The food box provider said running two warehouses is no longer efficient and is leading to overlapping work.
But the firm insisted it is focussed on supporting the nearly 290 staff who could be out of work if the plans go ahead.
Timo Boldt, Gousto’s founder and chief executive, said the impact on workers in Clay Lake who have “contributed enormously to Gousto’s journey over the years” makes the proposal “incredibly difficult.”
Gousto campaigns against fast food
“In a highly competitive food market, it is however essential that we operate as efficiently as possible so that we can continue to invest in our proposition and keep prices as low as possible for customers,” Boldt said.
“Our focus now is on supporting people through this process with care, respect and practical help,” he added.
Boldt founded Gousto in 2012 with the mission to “build a model where food waste was no longer an issue”.
The meal box tycoon has campaigned against fast food and dubbed the rise of weight loss jabs a “depressing state of affairs”.
He told City AM earlier this year: “People are trying to engineer this ‘bliss point’, where they combine fat, salt and sugar to find the point where you can’t stop eating, and can’t stop shaking off the cravings.”