Jobs 'safe' at Esso gas stations

WEDNESDAY, SEPT. 5: Gas station chief Craig Cannonier stepped in as seven catering staff faced possible redundancy after ESSO decided to farm out its food franchises to Bermuda chain Buzz.

Now all the staff — spread across three gas stations across the island — will be redeployed in other roles in the chain as Buzz takes over the food part of the operation.

ESSO general manager Steven DeCosta said that, as a franchise operation, a decision on catering provision was up to ESSO Bermuda.

He added: “The contract is between Buzz and ESSO Bermuda and that’s exactly what happened.”

Mr DeCosta said the franchisees were told of the decision late on Friday by ESSO Bermuda and only had a chance to meet with the affected staff yesterday because of the holiday weekend.

Mr DeCosta added: “I said that there would be redundancies in the food section and that we would try to help them into Buzz or other positions.

“Craig said he wanted the management team to incorporate these particular employees — who were facing redundancy because we will no longer be running the food section — into our other operations.

“All the affected staff will have jobs — some will be doing some pump attending, which some do already, or merchandising or cashiering.

“It’s been a bit of shuffling, but some people already do extra shifts in other areas, so many are used to that.”

Mr DeCosta added: “We don’t know why ESSO has made the change, but I understand they will be issuing a press release and maybe they will say why.”

But he said that the trend in the US, UK and Caribbean was towards outside operators to come in and take over food and catering parts of gas station operations.

Company president Mr Cannonier, who is also an MP and leader of the Opposition OBA, added: “I said we needed to find a way to offer our people something which wouldn’t have them being not sure what was happening to them.

“We wanted to save their jobs; it’s not a nice time, but we have got to try to what we have to do to protect people’s jobs. It was a new branding decision by corporate ESSO which was out of my hands, but what we can control is how we can do something about this situation.”

The firm employs dozens of employees across three stations, the ESSO City gas station, one in Warwick and another at Collector’s Hill in Smith’s.

Mr Cannonier said: “We have long-term staff involved here, people who have worked for us for ten years, so I felt we had to do what we could — which is what we did.”

Buzz management declined to comment on the change yesterday, while ESSO Bermuda had not issued a statement by press time.