News / XPO Logistics to axe 190 Con-way LTL jobs as efficiency measures begin

XPO Logistics has announced that it is to make 190 non-sales staff redundant as part of its rationalisation plan following its $3bn takeover of Con-way.

The company said that the eliminated positions were mainly in administrative, management and back office roles in Con-way’s less-than-truckload (LTL) division and represented less than 1% of Con-way’s North American LTL headcount.

It added that the redundancies would reduce its cost base by $20m a year, adding to $50m in savings it said it had already achieved since it took over Con-way at the end of October.

XPO has targeted a profit improvement for the unit of $170m-$210m within two years, and added that it now intended a sales staff recruitment drive.

Tony Brooks, president of LTL for XPO Logistics (pictured), said: “Our plan for LTL is very much on track for our near-term and long-term goals. The integration of Con-way has given us the opportunity to engineer a leaner, more results-oriented LTL operation while improving on our industry-leading customer service levels.

“We plan to double the number of strategic account managers over the next few months. Our focus is on growing LTL by expanding our service capabilities and cross-selling LTL to XPO’s customer base.

“Our new organisational structure is based on clearly delineated P&L responsibilities and customer service accountability at the field level. We’re also optimising our footprint to increase the efficient use of our capacity, improve transit times in key lanes and make our entire network more productive,” he added.

After several years of sustained acquisition activity, it appears that the pace of XPO’s expansion is beginning to slow down. Although he declined to rule out further purchases, chief executive Bradley Jacobs told The Loadstar in November that the focus had changed.

“It’s not on acquisitions right now. Whereas I was spending about half my time on acquisitions, I am now spending precisely none of my time on them,” he said.