Aramark to lay off 386 employees in Bellingham after Western U. food service contract ends
Aramark, a major food service and uniform provider, plans to lay off 386 Bellingham-based employees after the company’s contract to provide dining services at Western Washington University ended.
A Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) has been filed by Aramark with the Washington State Employment Security Department.
Aramark declined to comment on the workforce reduction but issued this statement:
“Our contract to provide food/facilities/concessions services at Western Washington University has concluded. It is our understanding that affected employees will have the opportunity to apply for positions with the University’s new provider. We are also working with impacted employees to access other job opportunities within our company,” a spokesperson for Aramark’s Corporate Communications wrote in an email to The Bellingham Herald.
According to the WARN, the 386 permanent layoffs are expected to begin Aug. 31.
It’s not known how many people are employed in the Bellingham facility and whether all or only part of the workforce is being affected by the loss of the Western Washington contract.
Western Washington University announced that Chartwells Higher Education will be its new campus dining partner.
“The vast majority of our front-line staff and student workers will have the opportunity to work for Chartwells on Sept. 1, and the majority of those conversations between student employees and Chartwells have already occurred,” a WWU spokesperson wrote in an email to The Bellingham Herald.
The state employment security department is assisting Aramark in the transition.
“Staff from the local rapid response team and WorkSource center will perform outreach to employees of the organization to ease the transition,” the department said in the WARN.
This is the second major layoff in the past 2 1/2 years by the Bellingham facility.
In January 2021, The Herald reported that with Western Washington offering mostly online instruction during the COVID-19 pandemic, Aramark was being forced to reduce its staff by 183 people.
“Unfortunately, like other companies and industries across the economy impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic, we have had to make some very difficult decisions. Due to a reduction of in-person instruction and on-campus residents, we had no choice but to modify staffing levels,” according to a statement.
The company said at the time it expected those layoffs to be temporary and that workers would be called back once on-campus classes resumed.
Aramark is a national company with headquarters in Philadelphia. It has more than 300 service locations, including Bellingham, Spokane and Seattle in Washington state, according to the company’s website.
The company provides facilities management and uniform services in addition to food services for schools, hospitals, prisons and leisure companies and stores.
