Morrisons is to close its Ravensthorpe store as part of a cost-cutting move which is set to result in 400 job losses.

A spokeswoman for the Bradford-based retailer said the Huddersfield Road store was one of 10 loss-making stores earmarked for closure.

But she declined to say how many people worked there or how many of those jobs would be lost, saying the number of job losses would not necessarily correspond to the number of employees.

She said: “We have looked extremely carefully at whether the store can be turned around, but unfortunately we cannot see a way of making it viable. We are therefore proposing its closure. We are consulting with colleagues and unions to reduce the risk of redundancies and we are looking at ways of redeploying colleagues around our business.”

The store, which includes butchery and bakery departments, is one of five Morrisons stores in Kirklees – with the others at Waterloo, Meltham and King Street in Huddersfield and at Heckmondwike. Morrisons also has stores at Elland and Halifax among more than 30 across West Yorkshire.

Morrisons announced the closure plan on Tuesday – along with the ousting of chief executive Dalton Philips – as it unveiled a 3.1% fall in like-for-like sales for the six weeks to January 4.

Sainsbury’s also announced plans to axe 500 posts at its store support centres as part of a £500m cost saving drive first announced last November.

The moves come against a background of intense competition between big supermarket groups Sainsbury’s Morrisons, Asda and Tesco and their low-cost rivals Aldi and Lidl which has seen the big five lose market share and make price cuts running into hundreds of millions of pounds.

Shopworkers union Usdaw, which represents 180,000 Tesco staff, has demanded details of the company’s recovery plan which will see the closure of 43 stores.

The troubled supermarket giant last week announced it had scrapped plans to build a superstore on the current site of Huddersfield Sports Centre.

And Tesco has announced it will be closing its Hertfordshire head office and 43 stores as part of its recovery plan.

There are a number of Tesco and Tesco Express store in the area inclduing Huddersfield, Brighouse, Dalton, Marsh, Bradley, Moldgreen, Batley and Cleckheaton.

Usdaw national officer Pauline Foulkes said: “What is worse is that the company has still not declared which shops they intend to close, leaving staff in all 3,000-plus stores worrying whether it is theirs that will close, creating additional anxiety and uncertainty”.