Ralphs Says It Will Lay Off 105 Workers : Another 30 Reassigned as Part of Campeau Takeover

About 105 employees of Ralphs Grocery will be laid off Monday and an additional 30 or so workers will be reassigned in connection with the company’s takeover by Campeau Corp.

The cutbacks will be in distribution, manufacturing and the main headquarters office in Compton, Gene Brown, vice president of human resources, acknowledged Friday after Ralphs workers called The Times. Only three store-level jobs are being eliminated, Brown added.

“The place is in an uproar right now,” one employee said.

“It happened so fast,” another noted. “Typical grocery industry.”

Ralphs headquarters employs about 700 workers out of total employment chainwide of 16,500.

“Yesterday and today we have been talking to people who will be reassigned to other positions,” Brown said. The employees to be laid off will be informed Monday, he added.

However, employees said some headquarters workers, in marketing, already were aware that they were losing their jobs.

The workers to be reassigned reportedly were given until next week to decide whether to accept jobs that some viewed as demotions.

Brown stressed that all furloughed employees will be given help finding new jobs.

Some Already Quit

According to Brown, the only store positions affected are three assistant district manager posts that are being eliminated. Those employees will be moved to different jobs in the stores, with no reduction in pay, he said.

Aside from that, he said, “there will be no impact in the stores whatsoever.”

One employee said that the staff responsible for selecting merchandise was “being hit badly, with the buyer level moderately pounded.” In the accounting department, that employee noted, some workers had already quit because “they had seen the level of debt (associated with the takeover) and had seen the handwriting on the wall.”

Campeau’s takeover of Federated Department Stores, owner of Ralphs, was effectively completed Friday afternoon after expiration of Campeau’s offer to buy Federated shares. Robert Campeau, chairman of his Toronto development firm, is establishing a separate subsidiary to own most of Ralphs, with a minority stake in the 129-store chain to be bought by management.

Some cutbacks at the company, which will be taking on substantial debt in connection with the deal, were expected. In a recent interview, neither Campeau nor Ralphs Chairman Byron Allumbaugh would disclose the extent of the planned layoffs.

Some workers expressed resentment that the reassignments and layoffs were disclosed soon after an announcement of several promotions among higher-level executives.

One theorized that the appointments were made so that some of the executives could qualify for participation in the equity ownership plan.

Asked whether the 105 layoffs were a harbinger of more significant cutbacks, Brown said: “That’s all we have planned.”