Spirit to close S&N Retail headquarters

Spirit Group is to close the Northampton headquarters of Scottish & Newcastle Retail following its acquisition of the company last month.

Spirit said operations for the enlarged company will in future be concentrated at its existing headquarters at Burton-on-Trent.

The announcement will come as a bitter blow to most of the 600 staff employed at Lakeside House in Northampton, although details of redundancies will not be an-nounced until early in the New Year.

Spirit said it considered a number of options but stressed its decision was based on commercial considerations.

Spirit chairman Tony Campbell said: "The decision to close Lakeside House was a difficult one.

"We realise this news must be extremely disappointing for the team in Northampton, however we are looking to retain the knowledge and skills identified in S&NR where possible.

The closure of Lakeside House does not rule anyone out from remaining within our enlarged group."

The Northampton office will remain open until May next year although Spirit says it will take 12 months to complete the whole group integration process.

It will be in a position to announce a new integrated structure for the business next February.

National Association of Licensed House Managers' general secretary Peter Love said the decision would come as a big disappointment to the Northampton workforce.

"It will not affect NALHM's day-to-day work with the new Spirit Group that much, but there is concern that the company will sell off a large number of bottom-end pubs which will clearly impact our members," he said.

Lakeside House was opened in October 2001 boasting a wealth of facilities and amenities.

It provides a designated people development centre committed to providing the best training in the hospitality sector.

It offers a dedicated learning resource centre with multimedia-capable PCs, books, journals, videos and CD-ROMs to help staff with their personal development.