Brussels (Brussels Morning Newspaper) – CORA, a grocery chain owned by Louis Delhaize, is closing 7 stores in Belgium by 2026, affecting 1,800 workers. The malls are sold to Mitiska REM. Workers and unions express concern.
CORA, a grocery store chain owned by the Louis Delhaize group, is closing 7 stores in Belgium. This decision comes after years of financial problems. The stores will close by early 2026. About 1,800 workers will lose their jobs.
The stores that are closing are in La Louvière, Hornu, Chatelineau, Rocourt, Woluwe, Anderlecht, and Messancy. Workers at nearby shopping malls and a supply depot in Heppignies will also be affected. This is the latest step in a series of changes to try to fix the company’s financial problems, but they haven’t worked.
Is CORA’s closure of 7 Belgian stores the end of an era?
CORA tried to sell its stores to other companies, but that didn’t work. Because of this, the company decided to close the stores and lay off workers. Officials mentioned that hypermarkets are struggling and that traditional stores are facing challenges from online shopping. People are buying more things online, and there are more stores competing for customers. This makes it hard for traditional stores to stay in business.
“Despite all the efforts made by the teams and the actions taken to rectify the situation, the results are proving to be very insufficient in the context of a major crisis in thedistribution sector in Belgium,”
CORA management stated in a press release.
CORA is closing its 7 stores in Belgium, but the shopping malls around those stores are being sold to a company called Mitiska REM. Mitiska REM will buy the malls and make changes to them. They will split the space that CORA used into smaller stores for rent.
According to the officials, people would go to the malls because CORA was there, but now that CORA is leaving, the malls need to find new ways to attract shoppers. CORA says they tried to make their business better, but they couldn’t keep up with the changes in shopping.
“People were stunned. There were tears. And then they got up and went back to work,”
Cora Management.
CORA is closing its stores, and many workers are worried about their jobs. Some workers have worked at CORA for many years, even decades. They tried to help the company get better, but it didn’t work.
One store in Liège has many families working there, and they are especially worried about what will happen next. The workers are sad and shocked, but they are still doing their jobs. They mentioned that it’s hard to find new jobs after working at one place for so long.
” Staff should be given a statutory notice period “,
hopes Patrick Masson, First Secretary at Setca, who fears a social and family catastrophe. The terms of the workers’ dismissals are not yet known.
People were surprised to know that CORA stores are closing. Customers were shocked and sad, especially because so many people would lose their jobs. One woman said it wasn’t right to lay off 2000 people. Another person said it’s bad for the workers and the whole area because people won’t be able to shop there anymore.
Officials mentioned that CORA stores were important to the communities where they were located. These stores were the last ones left from the Louis Delhaize group. Other stores from that group were sold to different companies, and CORA’s stores in other countries were also sold.
The company that owns CORA stores tried to sell the stores for a long time, but nobody wanted to buy them. The company had to give CORA a lot of money to keep it running. CORA had been struggling for a while, and the workers had been worried about their jobs for months.
In March 2024, some workers even blocked the entrance to the warehouse to show how worried they were. The workers were afraid they would lose their jobs because the company was having trouble competing with other stores.
“We can no longer reassure workers,“
said Myriam Delmée, president of Setca.
“They are experiencing their third wave of restructuring since 2015. “
