Amazon Cuts Jobs at Amazon Fresh Banner

Company lays off hundreds of employees who served as zone leads

7/26/2023

As part of its refocus and streamlining of the Amazon Fresh business, Amazon is cutting zone lead jobs at those physical stores.

Another round of job cuts has hit Amazon. According to a report in the Washington Post, the company is restructuring its Amazon Fresh business and laying off hundreds of zone leads tasked with managing certain areas of the physical stores and training associates.

Since the beginning of 2023, Amazon has cut more than 27,000 employees from its rolls across various functions, including stores, grocery tech, advertising and cloud computing, among other areas.

[Read more: “Amazon Fresh Retools Its Strategy Across the Pond”]

The latest move was confirmed by Amazon spokesperson Jessica Martin in a statement. "Like any retailer, we periodically assess our stores' organizational needs and make decisions to increase efficiencies for our employees and deliver customer value," Martin wrote. "As a result, we've decided to evolve our in-store staffing and operations model to better serve our customers and teams."

Affected team members can apply for other jobs within the Amazon organization and have access to severance payments. "We remain committed to our grocery business, and we're working closely with affected employees to help them find new shifts or roles within Amazon," Martin added.

As Amazon sorts out its brick-and-mortar grocery business, the retailer has hit the pause button on the construction and opening of several Amazon Fresh stores around the United States. The company also shuttered nine Amazon Go c-stores this year.

Despite the setbacks, Amazon is not throwing in the towel on its branded stores. In an earnings call earlier this year, CEO Andy Jassy said the company remains committed to physical retailing beyond its Whole Foods banner, noting, “We’ve been in it for a while and we have a large grocery business. Interestingly, in this current environment, where consumers are being cautious about what they spend and finding ways to trade down in different product variations, consumables has stayed very strong and we continue to be very pleased with that part of our grocery business.”

Amazon currently operates 44 Amazon Fresh stores around the United States, most of them in California and Illinois. The company will release its second quarter 2023 financial results on Aug. 3.

Seattle-based Amazon is No. 2 on The PG 100, Progressive Grocer’s 2023 list of the top food and consumables retailers in North America. PG also named the company one of its Retailers of the Century.