The five Casino union organizations, “worried” about the future of the group in great financial difficulty and which could sell new supermarkets and hypermarkets, announced this Friday, December 1, that they had filed a strike notice with management from December 5.
This strike notice, which runs until December 31, “concerns all employees and managers of the Casino group and is caused by the lack of consideration towards them and the worrying situation regarding the future of the integrity of Casino” , declared the inter-union organizations in a joint statement. “Employees, supervisors, executives and managers demand a response from current management and members of the consortium (of buyers of their group, Editor’s note) to the request for a meeting with their union representatives,” added the five unions.
“A carving up of the group”
This meeting had been requested on Wednesday by the inter-union, which had warned that in the absence of a response it would draw “the consequences”. The unions fear “a carving up of the group” since Casino said it was ready to study “shows of interest” from competitors for the purchase of hypermarkets and supermarkets which have not yet been sold by the distributor in a perilous economic situation.
Several major retail brands confirmed Thursday evening that they had submitted offers, including a joint one from Auchan and the Les Mousquetaires/Intermarché group. Intermarché already agreed with Casino a few months ago for the purchase of 119 stores, plus around sixty as an option. Around sixty changed brands at the beginning of October. Casino, for its part, said “to date it has received preliminary indicative offers from several buyers, covering different areas of hypermarkets and supermarkets”. But the group refused to give more details on these offers “under examination”. He added that “any sale operation must be previously approved by the consortium” candidate for the takeover of Casino around the Czech billionaire Daniel Kretinsky and the Frenchman Marc Ladreit de Lacharrière.