Sandwich maker Greencore has said it is hiring thousands of UK workers as demand for its products rebounds with the reopening of the economy.

Chief executive Patrick Coveney told Sky’s Ian King Live that the Dublin-based company was taking on employees at sites including Worksop, Northampton and Liverpool.

Mr Coveney was speaking as Greencore, which makes products from sandwiches and salad to sushi and soup for the likes of Marks & Spencer, reported half-year results.

Greencore, whose customers also include all the major UK supermarkets as well as convenience and travel retailers and coffee shops, slipped to a £1.8m loss for the six months to 26 March, compared with a £27.3m profit a year earlier.

The company said revenues fell 19% to £577m mainly thanks to the impact of the pandemic on demand for “food to go” while it also took a £4.8m hit related to COVID-19 costs.

But it added that over the last 12 months it has secured new business worth £175m a year in sales and had seen “encouraging” momentum in recent weeks, with revenues running only about 5% below pre-COVID levels.

Mr Coveney said: “This has been a challenging period for Greencore, but the consistent build in our revenues since early March as lockdown measures have eased and COVID-19 cases have fallen give us real cause for optimism.”

The company, which employs 12,000 people – the vast majority in the UK – is investing in robotic technology at its biggest manufacturing plants, partly to offset the impact of wage inflation which it said was running at 4%.

Mr Coveney told Sky News that the food industry was seeing a “tightness” in the jobs market which was partly due to the “reset of the labour force” as a result of Brexit.

He added that that currently Greencore was seeing a “significant” step up in hiring.

“We’re probably going to bring about 5,000 new people into our production and supply chain network between 1 March and 1 July and that’s a big step-up and does require us to be able to on-board safely lots of new people,” Mr Coveney said.

He said the hiring would mainly be in sandwich, salad and sushi facilities in Worksop, London and Northampton, Lincolnshire and Liverpool.

“They would be the biggest areas where we’re looking to bring new people into the business to meet this very, very strong rebound in demand as the COVID restrictions are being eased,” he added.

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