All articles tagged with #cost control
Despite facing increased costs from tariffs and inflation, American chain restaurants maintain their affordability and consistency through rigorous cost management, standardization, and strategic sourcing, with major distributors like Sysco playing a key role in supply chain efficiency.
Starbucks will give all salaried North American employees a 2% raise as part of a broader turnaround strategy focused on improving service, store environment, and operational efficiency, while managing costs through workforce adjustments and executive incentives.
Microsoft is cutting approximately 9,000 jobs in its second major layoff wave this year to reduce costs and support its AI expansion, impacting less than 4% of its workforce across various teams and regions, amid ongoing restructuring and increased AI investments.
The mortgage industry faces uncertain market conditions and varying predictions for interest rates, but lenders must focus on long-term trends such as cost control and leveraging digital technology. Lenders are advised to automate tasks, invest in digital initiatives like eClosings, and consider consolidating relationships with larger providers. Compliance and risk management teams should be fully staffed and supported, with data and analytics solutions to automate compliance tasks. Wolters Kluwer offers solutions to help drive productivity, ensure compliance, and enhance customer experience in the mortgage industry.
Lowe's has cut its annual sales and profit forecasts due to waning demand for home improvement tools and sticky inflation forcing consumers to cut back on discretionary spending. However, shares reversed premarket losses and were up 2% in morning trading. Lowe's expects full-year comparable sales to fall between 2% and 4%, compared to its prior outlook of flat to down 2%. While Lowe's reported a steeper-than-expected fall in first-quarter comparable sales, it topped profit expectations, with margins holding up better thanks to tighter cost control.
Amazon's cloud business, AWS, is implementing new restrictions on managers' hiring abilities to control costs as sales growth slows. The company has introduced a headcount management system called Roster, which will act as "the source of truth for approved headcount plans." All potential hires must be filtered through Roster to ensure they are matched with a specific open position. The changes come after Amazon announced 9,000 job cuts in March, which impacted its cloud division. AWS is working on controls to create a more disciplined hiring system that aligns with approved business demands by EOY 2023.
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced that AI has helped the company increase traffic to Facebook and Instagram and boost ad sales, leading to a surge in shares by 12%. The company also beat expectations for Q1 profit and revenue, and narrowed its cost outlook range for the year. Meta has been slow to adopt AI-friendly hardware and software systems, but has carried out several expensive overhauls to bolster its core business. The company has also kicked off an aggressive cost-cutting drive, with plans to eliminate 21,000 jobs and flatten its middle-management structure.