Amazon, the US retail giant, is mulling over closing the site in Milton Keynes, which was the first Amazon centre to open in 1998.
09:01, 15 Jan 2026
Amazon is shuttingone of its fulfilment centres and transferring workers to another site. Amazon, the US retail giant, is mulling over closing the site in Milton Keynes, which was the first Amazon centre to open in 1998.
Amazon said the 590 employees affected by the announcement will be offered a transfer to its new site in Northampton or to other centres.
An Amazon spokesman said: “We’re always evaluating our network to make sure it fits our business needs and to improve the experience for our employees and customers.
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“Today we’ve announced a consultation on a proposal to close our fulfilment centre in Milton Keynes and to offer employees an opportunity to transfer to our brand-new site in Northampton – a larger, state-of-the-art building which will employ up to 2,000 people – or to other Amazon sites.
“Our top priority is to support our people during this process.”
Amazon said a collective consultation will now begin with the affected employees, who will be offered an opportunity to transfer to its new Northampton site – which will be employing 1,400 people initially, rising to 2,000 – or to other Amazon sites.
The £500 million Northampton building is scheduled to open in May.
A large Amazon sortation centre, which forms a separate part of its logistics business, is also based in Milton Keynes and is unaffected by the proposals.
Amazon employs more than 1.5 million staff globally in total, of which about 350,000 are in office-based roles – while the majority of workers are in warehouse jobs.
The company employs about 75,000 people in the UK.
Beth Galetti, senior vice president of people experience and technology at Amazon, said in a message to employees: “The reductions we’re sharing today are a continuation of this work to get even stronger by further reducing bureaucracy, removing layers and shifting resources to ensure we’re investing in our biggest bets and what matters most to our customers’ current and future needs.”
She added: “The world is changing quickly.
“This generation of AI is the most transformative technology we’ve seen since the internet and it’s enabling companies to innovate much faster than ever before.
“We’re convicted that we need to be organised more leanly, with fewer layers and more ownership, to move as quickly as possible for our customers and business.”