Over half of office workers have nowhere but their desk to eat lunch

One in three UK workers don’t have any form of breakout space to get away from their desk and over half (56 percent) of them don’t even have anywhere to eat lunch in their office, new research claims. The survey of  UK office workers carried out by Furniture123.co.uk suggests that as a result of this 34 percent of employees say they resort to eating lunch at their desk, which they feel is having a detrimental effect on morale and productivity. Nearly three quarters (69 percent) of those surveyed felt they worked less productively as a result of not taking a break away from their desk over lunch, and almost half (47 percent) believe they would work more efficiently in the afternoons if they took a full hour for lunch. The research also claims that 46 percent said they would like to get out of the office for a walk during their lunch break, but almost half of these (47 percent) felt they had nowhere to go or didn’t like the local area.

Mark Kelly, marketing manager at Furniture123.co.uk, says: “Happy workers are more productive. This sentiment has been proven time and time again, and it’s one of the many reasons why it’s so important to keep employees on side. Providing staff with somewhere to eat lunch is an office essential, and the simple act of getting away from the desk and taking a break, even for ten minutes, enables workers to push the reset button and come back to work with a clearer head and renewed focus.”

The research revealed that 35 percent of UK workers take their lunch outside to eat when the weather is nice and a fifth (21 percent) even confess to running over their allocated lunch break. When asked what breakout features they would like to see in the office, a designated lunch area topped the list (76 percent), followed by sofas (70 percent) and bean bags (62 percent). Completing the top 5 were a garden or terrace (59 percent) and a ping pong table (52 percent).