Gorillas wants to close Spain – 300 employees before dismissal

The battered delivery service continues to reduce staff. Now it comes to Spain. The layoffs may surprise those affected.

images alliance / ROBIN UTRECHT | ROBIN UTRECHT

The Berlin Gorillas express delivery service plans to lay off hundreds of employees again. The reason is the stoppage of all activities at the deposit in Spain, such as various Spanish media report consistently. A total of around 300 employees are affected, including drivers. Gorillas has been active so far in the cities of Madrid, Valencia, Alicante and Barcelona. All production sites and warehouses will soon be closed.

The gorillas informed Gründerszene that on June 15 “legal proceedings were initiated to examine the reduction”. Employees are asked to designate appropriate representatives for negotiations. There will probably also be severance pay. Until further notice, customers in Spanish cities would continue to be supplied, according to a spokeswoman.

Layoffs surprise employees. According to the news site The confidential The country manager responsible for Spain, Magdalena Szuszkiewicz, would have denied such plans at the end of May. As she told the outlet at the time, Gorilas was only looking for a buyer for her Spanish business. Seemingly unsuccessful, as she now demonstrates.

Second mass layoff in a few weeks

Just three weeks ago, the gorillas had massively cut jobs. More than 300 employees were laid off at the Berlin headquarters, almost half of the team. The company is working to become profitable, but needs to adjust its cost structure. “In the context of our business goals, we carefully examined our staffing structures and made the difficult decision to reorganize our teams around the world,” he said.

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Gorillas is laying off more than 300 employees, roughly half of all employees at headquarters.

Even then, however, more job cuts were expected. In the future, they want to concentrate on the five main markets of Germany, France, Great Britain, the Netherlands and the USA, which, according to the company, account for 90 percent of total sales. Since then, operations in Italy, Spain, Denmark and Belgium have been “strategically reviewed”.

Breaking even faster is just one of the reasons for the layoffs. The delivery service is also concerned with making itself attractive to new investors with cost savings. As Gründerszene reported in February, CEO Kagan Sümer wants to “$700 million or more” pick up. However, the financing round has not yet been completed.