Former Tesco finance chief Laurie McIlwee to join the board of Giraffe restaurant chain and Ed’s Easy Diner parent group March 7, 2017 A former Tesco finance chief is poised to join the board of the restaurant group that owns the likes of Giraffe and Ed’s Easy Diner, according to reports. Laurie McIlwee has been appointed executive chairman of Boparan Restaurant Group, Sky News reported, months after being cleared of any involvement in Tesco’s 2014 profit overstatement scandal. Read [...]
Most entertainment is consumed online through access services and is not owned outright March 7, 2017 Britons now spend almost 80 per cent of their total expenditure on entertainment online and are increasingly consuming it via access services such as Spotify and mobile apps like Pokemon Go. Data from the Entertainment Retailers Association (ERA), which represents retailers and digital services offering music, video and games, shows that 27.6 per cent of [...]
This is what the booze and tobacco sectors are hoping to see in the Spring Budget March 6, 2017 The countdown is nearly over – the Spring Budget is now just two days away. Britain's beer and spirits sector has been campaigning for weeks in a bid to urge chancellor Philip Hammond to cut the beer duty while the industry grapples with cost pressures from rocketing business rates and increases to the national minimum wage. Here's [...]
Demand for travel to the US has slowed amid confusion and anger over Trump’s travel ban March 6, 2017 As Donald Trump readies his revamped travel ban, new figures show demand for travel to the US has slowed after a promising start to the year. Overall, travel bookings to the US over the next three months are down 0.4 per cent on last year. However, the day before Trump's travel ban was imposed, bookings were up [...]
How pay-as-you-go chain The Gym Group built up its muscle and plans to bulk up further March 6, 2017 Since opening in 2008, pay-as-you-go chain The Gym Group has grown at a rate of knots. Led by chief executive John Treharne, the gym operator is the second largest budget gym in the UK with 89 sites and 448,000 members as of December. The group has a plan to open a further 15 to 20 [...]
Gym group David Lloyd is for sale March 5, 2017 David Lloyd owners are preparing to sell the gym chain for £1.3bn, according to The Telegraph. A sale of the gym group, which runs 83 clubs in the UK and 12 in the Netherlands, Belgium and Spain, is expected to draw considerable interest from private equity investors. However, the sale cannot proceed until a prior [...]
Sir Philip Green plugs another pensions hole at Arcadia March 5, 2017 Sir Philip Green has finalised plans to tackle yet another pension scheme deficit, this time at his own retail giant Arcadia. Arcadia will double its payments to the company's pensions scheme from £25m a year to £50m, helping to cover a near £200m deficit. The agreement comes just days after the billionaire settled a dispute [...]
Turnaround plan looks set to pay off for Morrisons March 5, 2017 The turnaround at Morrisons supermarkets headed by CEO David Potts looks set to gather speed this week as the company reports its best annual results in six years. The chain is likely to report a 54 per cent rise in pre-tax earnings to £335m on Thursday, according to predictions by banking firm Jefferies. The firm [...]
John Lewis employee bonuses set to take a hit March 5, 2017 Employees of the John Lewis Partnership can expect their annual bonuses to shrink this year. Bonuses are unlikely to be higher than six or seven per cent of income when the company releases full-year results on Thursday, according to sources close to the situation. This is down from to a 10 per cent bonus last year. The [...]
Fat Face adjusts debt as profits come under pressure March 5, 2017 British clothes retailer Fat Face has negotiated easier debt terms after its profits slumped due to the weakened pound. In a full year report posted on Friday, the company's directors confirmed that they had completed a “covenant reset” to an external financing agreement to secure greater “headroom”. They said this was a direct result of [...]