Gousto to create 1,000 new jobs as sales surge in lockdown

The recipe box provider wants to increase its customer fulfilment capacity threefold by 2022 and will build “multiple” new warehouses to service increasing demand. 

It comes after Gousto’s revenues hit £83m during the first six months of 2020, already exceeding its sales in the whole of 2019. It now expects to make its first-ever profit in 2020, compared to an operating loss of £12.5m last year.

As a result of that rapid growth, Gousto said it is “accelerating expansion plans” to meet what it said would be a “permanent” shift to online grocery shopping and people cooking more meals at home.  

Gousto said that at peak times during its second quarter, website traffic was 10-times regular levels. 

The business, which operated a streamlined service with reduced choice during lockdown to help it service demand, uses artificial intelligence to predict order quantities and keep food waste at close to zero. 

It plans to further leverage its tech expertise to introduce next-day deliveries and what it calls “first of its kind” meal customisation options. 

Gousto founder and chief executive Timo Boldt said the rapidly changing sales patterns represented what he called a “permanent redrawing of the grocery landscape”. 

He added: “The UK recipe box market has come of age with the recent lockdown accelerating structural trends which were already firmly underway. 

“Overnight, our market has opened up to a far larger audience with new customers won over by the variety of meals, convenience of fresh ingredients delivered directly to your door and the ease of creating a delicious home-cooked dinner.

“With a hugely dedicated and incredible team of people, Gousto is best placed to capitalise on this market growth, given our unrivalled technology, scale and market-leading customer proposition, underpinned by access to both external capital and our positive cash flow.”