Of the 500 employees, half are holiday relief workers who were originally employed in connection with the summer holidays, so in reality the dismissals will affect 250 employees.

Obliged to react

"A situation like this is always regrettable because it inevitably has an impact on people’s lives. However, it is the only responsible thing to do in order to maintain a healthy balance between the number of hands and the amount of work. If we don’t react immediately to changing capacity needs, we would have to dismiss many more people in the long term because our competitiveness would suffer," according to Danish Crown’s Technical Director Søren F. Eriksen.

High labour costs continue to pose a major challenge for the company, which explains the continued strong focus on capacity.

In the past year, Danish Crown has regularly taken on new employees, but now the trend is unfortunately reversed.

New face for ESS-FOOD

One area of this year’s joint Danish Crown stand at the Anuga trade show in Cologne is attracting particular attention. Here, the traditional tables and chairs have been replaced by a gigantic red sofa and a black supermarket trolley, and this is where we find ESS-FOOD.

ESS-FOOD is using Europe’s largest food trade show as a platform for launching the company’s new visual identity.

The really eye-catching element on the stand is a new and modernised version of the well-known ESS-FOOD logo, and it has been positively received by visitors as well as organisers. The modern logo is everywhere – on the walls and even in the shape of the red sofa.

"For a number of years, our logo has featured a drawing of a pig and a cow, and this has presented certain challenges because ESS-FOOD operates worldwide selling a large and varied product programme," said Morten Holm, CEO of ESS-FOOD.

"In the new logo, we hold on to the globe reference from the old logo, but in a highly simplified version, thereby looking to the future without detracting from ESS-FOOD’s recognisability," Mr Holm explained.

The logo has met with lots of praise at Anuga; for example, a group of designers rate the ESS-FOOD stand in the top five out of more than 6,500 exhibitors at the show.

"ESS-FOOD is a global and modern company, and we are delighted that others have confirmed that the new logo helps to communicate its strengths," said Mr Holm.