Just Eat to recruit 1,500 for Sunderland hub

JUST Eat is to create 1,500 jobs in the North East as part of a £100m investment in a customer services hub in Sunderland.

The food delivery company said it had recruited for 300 roles and aimed to fill the remaining openings over the next 12 months. Employees will initially work from home, before moving to a “hybrid” of mixed home and office working.

The new openings come as Just Eat attempts to win market share rivals such as Deliveroo and Ubereats, in particular in London.

The FTSE 100 company, which merged with Dutch rival Takeaway.com in a £6bn deal last year, said it expected its new 215,000 sq ft office to open early next year. The site, in Houghtonle-spring

in Sunderland, will house customer and restaurant support teams.

Just Eat has been rapidly expanding its staff and worker numbers in the UK, launching a new logistics arm, known as Scoober, and adding 4,500 delivery riders as workers. It previously relied on restaurants to supply their own delivery riders.

Andrew Kenny, Just Eat’s UK managing director, said most of its new Sunderland team would begin work from home, before the majority of the company returns to working in the office part time later this year. He said Just Eat’s other offices had reopened with the numbers returning “steadily building over time”.

“Staff appreciate retaining a considerable amount of flexibility,” he said, “but many are striving to get back into an office environment.”