Will on-pitch woes force Harlequins fans and sponsors away? Sport Business Watching Harlequins at the moment is either absolutely soul-crushing or completely baffling, depending on whether you support the London club or not. Soul-crushing because the club is supposed to represent the very best of attacking rugby in a fusion of England internationals and overseas superstars. Baffling because it should never have got this bad, losing [...]
Hollywood Bowl calls on dynamic pricing as heatwaves hit sales Leisure Hollywood Bowl called on its dynamic pricing system to endure falling ten-pin demand during the summer’s record heatwaves, prompting a share price boost. Britain’s biggest ten-pin bowling operator said the summer’s “exceptionally prolonged, dry weather” had “heavily impacted” its trading, as UK like-for-like revenue fell 5.6 per cent in the second half of this year. [...]
The Summer Slowdown can become a thing of the past Partner Every year through July and August, the same trend resurfaces across corporate Britain: the pace slows, offices empty and productivity dips. This summer, that has been more pronounced than ever. Britain is about to weather a record-breaking fifth heatwave of the year. Some of London’s biggest firms have slackened their in-the-office mandates and given staff [...]
On this day: the birth of press freedom August 5, 2026 On 5th August 1735 John Peter Zenger was acquitted of seditious libel on the basis that the criticisms of the government he has printed in The New York Weekly Journal were true. It was a judgement that established the basis of press freedom on which western democracy still depends, writes Eliot Wilson By the end [...]
‘Brutal onslaught’: Brewery McMullen’s takes aim at Reeves’ tax hikes after pub sell-off July 13, 2026 One of the UK’s biggest family-owned brewers has taken aim at Chancellor Rachel Reeves’ tax hikes after it sold off more than a quarter of its pub estate. Hertfordshire-based McMullen’s, which owned over 100 pubs before offloading 30 of them in January, has warned it is likely to struggle to stay profitable in the years [...]
Tax the robots to fix our jobs crisis June 24, 2026 Starmer leaves parliament with a jobs crisis in his wake. I urge his successor to tax tech rather than humans, writes James Reed.
Hollywood Bowl boss: ‘Incredibly painful’ tax hikes make it harder to hire May 27, 2026 The boss of Hollywood Bowl has hit out at Labour’s “incredibly painful” hikes to national insurance and the minimum wage for making it harder to employ workers. Stephen Burns, chief executive of the UK’s largest tenpin bowling operator, told City AM that Labour policy has made it “significantly more expensive to employ somebody than it [...]
B&Q owner eyes warm weather boost as sales fall May 26, 2026 B&Q’s FTSE 100 owner will be hoping for a heatwave boost after it blamed poor weather for falling sales at the start of the year. Kingfisher, which also owns Screwfix and home improvement retailers in France and Poland, saw total like-for-like sales dip by 0.9 per cent to £3.3bn in the first quarter of the [...]
Retail sales plummet as Iran war hits consumer confidence May 22, 2026 Retail sales plummeted by 1.3 per cent in April, as Brits cut back on spending amid increasing pressure from the war in Iran. The huge fall in retail sales volumes in April was the largest since May last year and defied economists’ forecasts of a softer drop. This comes after a 0.6 per cent rise in [...]
The story of Keir Starmer’s failure is boringly familiar May 18, 2026 Keir Starmer’s fate was not brought about chiefly by his lack of personality. It was the predictable result of the economic conditions that have wracked Britain for almost two decades, a political system poorly attuned to fixing them, and more than a little of his own hubris, says Andrew Griffith Analysing why Keir Starmer failed [...]