Alshaya Group, the retail giant in the Gulf region and the Starbucks franchisee in the Middle East, announced on Tuesday its intention to lay off two thousand employees due to the consequences of the consumer boycott related to the Gaza war.
The company said: “As a result of the ongoing difficult trading conditions over the past six months, we have made the very sad and difficult decision to reduce the number of associates in Starbucks stores in the Middle East and North Africa region.” Alshaya declined to answer questions about the number of employees it had laid off.
Alshaya is a private family company that owns the franchise rights to a variety of Western companies, including Shake Shack, H&M and The Cheesecake Factory in addition to Starbucks, and acknowledged in a statement the dismissal of employees from its locations in the Middle East and North Africa.
Informed sources, who requested anonymity, reported that the process of eliminating jobs that began on Sunday aims to lay off about four percent of the total workforce at Alshaya, which numbers about 50,000 people, and is mostly concentrated in Starbucks branches in the Middle East and North Africa.
One source stated that the boycott campaigns led to difficulties in the company’s working conditions. “We sympathize with the Starbucks employees who will be laid off, and we want to thank them for their contributions,” a Starbucks spokesperson told Reuters.
“Starbucks remains committed to working closely with Alshaya to achieve long-term growth in this important region,” he added.
Founded in 1890 in Kuwait, Alshaya Group is one of the largest retail franchisees in the region and has the operating rights to popular Western brands such as the Cheesecake Factory and Shake Shack.
It has had the rights to operate Starbucks cafes in the Middle East since 1999. The Starbucks unit operates about 2,000 outlets in 13 countries in the Middle East, North Africa and Central Asia.
Western brands have been affected by largely spontaneous popular boycott campaigns due to the war launched by Israel on the Gaza Strip in response to the Hamas attack on it on October 7.
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