Homebase in consultation with 300 store staff

Homebase is in consultation with up to 300 of its staff as the struggling DIY retailer seeks to realign its store leadership structure in the difficult trading environment.

In a statement Homeabse said: "The changes will create a more efficient and effective structure and help us to protect our levels of customer service while reducing costs. The restructure will potentially affect up to 300 colleagues across the business."   Homebase employees were told the news in a meeting this morning.   The retailer said: "Homebase will make every effort to manage the impact of this programme on those affected, while ensuring that any collective or individual concerns are appropriately addressed."   It said it will make "every effort to minimise the number of redundancies necessary" and anticipates this process will be completed by mid-March.   The planned new leadership team in stores will consist of the store manager, sales manager, showroom and seasonal manager, service manager, operations team leader and a number of team leaders covering key areas of the sales floor.   The retailer said store managers and operations team leaders will have broader responsibilities under the new proposals, while the focus of the team leader role remains unchanged.   The announcement comes on top of the news last year, revealed by Retail Week, that Homebase was planning to make hundreds of redundancies in a review of its central resource requirements. The consultation period for these redundancies is expected to close at the end of February.

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