Dive Brief:
- ConAgra employees are about to learn what the next wave of job cuts will be following the company's announcement last month that it would be eliminating about 1,500 non-plant workers, per memos sent out Wednesday, according to the Omaha World-Herald.
- "The memo [to the finance, information technology and enterprise business systems teams] said the company wasn’t finished with its review of positions, especially those to be outsourced, and more cuts could come in the next 30 to 90 days," the Omaha World-Herald reported.
- "We’ve been talking for the last several months about building an organization that can drive growth with a lower-cost operating model so that we can remain competitive with top-tier companies," Darren Serrao, chief growth officer, said in his memo. "We need to become a more lean, efficient, productive and agile company to succeed."
Dive Insight:
"ConAgra has said the job cuts — a total of 1,500 companywide, or about 30 percent of ConAgra’s office-based workers — will help the company shave $200 million off its annual expenses, along with outsourcing and cuts to discretionary spending like travel and catering. An additional $100 million in savings will come from cuts to costs tied to placing products with retailers," according to the Omaha World-Herald.
Chris Kircher, the company's vice president for corporate affairs, wrote in an email to the Omaha World-Herald it would not disclose layoff details externally "out of respect for our employees who are being informed through [Thursday]."
ConAgra already announced the elimination of about 40 IT jobs over the next six months, most of which the company said were either redundant or will be outsourced.
ConAgra has also announced this week that it will divest its private-label brands segment to TreeHouse Foods for $2.7 billion. Reclassification charges for those brands caused ConAgra's profits to fall to a net loss of $1.24 billion from a profit of $482.3 million the year before, according to the company's latest earnings report.