{"id":625882,"date":"2026-08-07T19:19:17","date_gmt":"2026-08-07T19:19:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/625882\/"},"modified":"2026-08-07T19:19:17","modified_gmt":"2026-08-07T19:19:17","slug":"sliding-sales-drastic-dave-and-job-cuts-what-is-going-on-at-diageo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/625882\/","title":{"rendered":"Sliding sales, \u2018Drastic Dave\u2019 and job cuts: what is going on at Diageo?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>THE CHIEF OF Diageo \u2013 whose brands include\u00a0Guinness, Smithwick\u2019s, Rockshore and Smirnoff \u2013 is to cut costs to save $1 billion (\u20ac866.4 million) over the next three years in a bid to tackle low growth. What\u2019s going on at the struggling drinks giant?<\/p>\n<p>The move, which may put up to 150 jobs in Diageo\u2019s Ireland operation at risk,\u00a0is part of a major overhaul under boss Dave Lewis after the company revealed weaker sales and profits for the past year.<\/p>\n<p>Lewis \u2013 a former Tesco chief executive who bears the nickname \u2018Drastic Dave\u2019 for aggressive cost cuts in his roles \u2013 took on the Diageo job in January.<\/p>\n<p>The alcoholic drinks market has been hit globally as it grapples with lower alcohol consumption and consumer struggles with the cost of living.<\/p>\n<p>Revenues at Diageo hit a decade low at the end of 2025, and on Thursday\u00a0the drinks giants reported a 3% decline in net sales to $19.6 billion (\u20ac16.98 billion) for the year to June.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/1786130356_641_.jpeg\"  alt=\"london-uk-29th-mar-2019-dave-lewis-group-cheif-executive-of-tesco-speaks-at-the-british-chambers-of-commerce-annual-conference-2019-in-westminster-credit-tommy-londonalamy-live-news\" class=\"alignnone inline-image\" \/><br \/>\n            Former Tesco chief executive Dave Lewis was previously dubbed \u201cDrastic Dave\u201d for his approach to cutting costs.<br \/>\n                    Alamy Stock Photo<\/p>\n<p>    Alamy Stock Photo<\/p>\n<p>Job cuts<\/p>\n<p>In June,\u00a0Diageo <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thejournal.ie\/diageo-job-cuts-7078122-Jun2026\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">informed staff that a number of Irish jobs will be cut<\/a>\u00a0as it undergoes restructuring.<\/p>\n<p>The company employs around 1,200 people in Ireland, across brewing, production, marketing, sales and commercial support. Diageo is globally headquartered in London, but its Irish base is at the historic St James\u2019s Gate Brewery in Dublin 8.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The Department of Enterprise received a notification from the company of proposed collective redundancies at the time. It\u2019s understood approximately 150 jobs will be affected.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Diageo has not yet disclosed the jobs impact of the restructuring, but losses look likely abroad too, with unions in Scotland warning that the group has placed 172 distillery workers at risk of redundancy.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The company employs over 30,000 people worldwide, with operations in 180 countries.<\/p>\n<p>Sliding sales<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/1786130357_991_.jpeg\"  alt=\"bottles-of-scotch-whiskies-of-the-diageo-group\" class=\"alignnone inline-image\" \/><br \/>\n            Whiskies of the Diageo group.                    Alamy Stock Photo<\/p>\n<p>    Alamy Stock Photo\n<\/p>\n<p>Diageo saw a downturn in revenues and profits under previous chief executive Debra Crew. But Lewis has said the business is \u201cconfident\u201d it can deliver improvement without its profits \u201ctaking a step back\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>Thursday\u2019s reports of a decline in net sales was dragged back further by weakness in North America, where net sales slid by 9.1% for the year.<\/p>\n<p>This was partly offset by 5.7% sales growth in Europe. The company saw a 6.8% growth in net sales in the UK driven by continued soaring demand for Guinness, which grew by \u201cdouble digits\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>Announcing the latest cost-cutting measures, Lewis said there is \u201chard work ahead\u201d for the business, particularly in North America.<\/p>\n<p>Around $850 million (\u20ac736.44 million) of Diageo\u2019s savings is set to come from operations, with around $150 million (\u20ac129.96 million) to be saved from its supply chain.<\/p>\n<p>Diageo said the restructuring costs linked to the shake-up would cost the company around $1.2 billion (\u20ac1.04 billion).<\/p>\n<p>Diageo also reduced its proposed dividend payment to shareholders by more than half compared with a year earlier following the reduction in profit.<\/p>\n<p>However, Lewis has categorically ruled out selling any of its over 200 brands of alcohol.<\/p>\n<p>Speaking to the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.businesspost.ie\/companies\/simplicity-scales-complexity-fails-drastic-dave-pitches-diageos-e860m-turnaround\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Business Post<\/a>, the CEO said: \u201cWe\u2019re not hawking our brands.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>He said many investment bankers have told him which brands he should sell.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe told all of them we\u2019re not selling any of them, so we\u2019re just going to roll our sleeves up and get on with our own business,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n<p>With additional reporting from PA.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"THE CHIEF OF Diageo \u2013 whose brands include\u00a0Guinness, Smithwick\u2019s, Rockshore and Smirnoff \u2013 is to cut costs to&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":625883,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[73],"tags":[79,207,264267,145011,36325,264268,18,11545,19,17,12482],"class_list":["post-625882","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-business","tag-business-news","tag-dampened-spirits","tag-dave-lewis","tag-diageo","tag-drinks-industry","tag-eire","tag-guinness","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-job-cuts"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/117055847080403047","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/625882","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=625882"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/625882\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/625883"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=625882"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=625882"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=625882"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}