Panera Bread, a popular bakery chain in the United States, announced that it would be cutting several corporate employees in the process of reorganizing the company structure. The company is centering its structure on general managers, and the layoffs will target project management, IT, and customer service positions. The cuts will affect workers in the St. Louis, Missouri, and Newton, Massachusetts offices, but no workers in Panera bread stores will lose their jobs. Affected employees will receive severance pay, pay for unused PTO, healthcare benefits, and career advising services. The layoffs are a part of Panera Bread’s plan to increase operating efficiency and customer satisfaction. Panera Bread conducted a previous round of layoffs in 2023, and three hundred employees in various support staff positions were eliminated during the layoffs.
See "Panera Bread announces layoffs that will affect corporate employees", Julie Littman, Restaurant Dive, October 7, 2024