Kellogg’s to move 80 jobs to Romania

KELLOGG’S looks set to move around 80 jobs from its UK headquarters site in Manchester to a new office in Bucharest, Romania.

The US group has chosen Bucharest for a European Global Business Services (GBS) centre which will handle human resources, IT, and supply chain processes, as well as finance jobs currently held by people at the Talbot Road office in Old Trafford.

Kellogg’s said it had started a consultation process with the staff affected. It employs around 600 people at the office.

In a statement chief executive John Bryant said: “To deliver on our strategy and grow our business around the world, we need new ways of operating in an increasingly complex, global business environment.”

The group added that a move to a GBS model, “will drive efficiencies that generate cost savings for Kellogg to reinvest in its business to drive growth… Some global GBS work could move to strategic business partners; while some regional GBS work could transition to Kellogg-operated service centers; and some local GBS work could be performed in existing Kellogg locations”.

Kelloggs said Bucharest was already home to similar service centres used by other multi-nationals such as P&G and Ericsson.

The world-famous maker of Cornflakes has a long history in the North West having set up a manufacturing base in Trafford Park 75 years ago. The most recent accounts for the Kellogg Marketing and Sales Company (UK) division – which reflects income from retail sales – show revenues slipped from £631.4m to £614.9m in the year to December 2012. Sales have been on a downward trend since 2010 when they reached high of £666.7m. However, pre-tax profits increased in 2012 from £12m to £16.1m, helped by lower administrative costs.