Brand Index: Discounters’ customers force top shops to up their game July 16, 2014 For consumers, every little helps, and the tills at Aldi and Lidl are ringing as the German discounters attract new and unlikely customers. YouGov’s mid-year BrandIndex’s Buzz rankings show that Aldi tops the list with Lidl coming in fourth, as consumers keep buying habits forged in the downturn. In our Buzz Metric, a measure of [...]
Ocado delivers a profit but sales growth slowing July 1, 2014 Shares in Ocado slid 4.3 per cent yesterday despite the online grocer moving into the black in the first half, paving the way for its first annual profit in its 13-year history. The company said pre-tax profits totalled £7.5m for the 24 weeks to 18 May, following a £3.8m loss last year, thanks [...]
As Ocado posts a half-year profit, will the business now go from strength to strength? July 1, 2014 Jonathan Jackson, a partner and head of equities at Killik & Co, says Yes. Ocado offers a unique way to play the expected strong growth in the UK online grocery market. The group offers investors the potential to benefit from its industry-leading intellectual property, built up over 13 years of investment in technology, to more [...]
Ocado share price dives on half-year results July 1, 2014 Online grocer Ocado has seen its share price drop 4.7 per cent after releasing half-year results for the 24 weeks ended 18 May. The fall comes as the company announced it was on track for its first ever annual pre-tax profit. The company swung back into the black with pre-tax profits reaching £7.5m compared to [...]
Samsung’s #Selfie4England backfires June 19, 2014 There is a long, rich and humorous history of hashtags backfiring on corporates but it doesn’t seem to stop them – step forward Samsung, who has been running the #Selfie4England since England’s first game last week. Let’s just say it’s been going wrong almost as much as right. A quick scan of the [...]
Waitrose to build on export success with premium brands June 18, 2014 WAITROSE yesterday announced plans to expand its own-label export business by selling products from brands including Cornish Sea Salt, Windsor and Eton Brewery and Pooch and Mutt pet food. In the last financial year, Waitrose saw a 30 per cent uplift in its export business, which provides its own brand label products to markets ranging [...]
Bottom Line: As the going gets tough, Justin King gets going June 11, 2014 There was a lot of back-slapping at Sainsbury’s yesterday, with Justin King talking up his successor, and his successor lavishing praise on the soon-to-depart chief executive. “When Justin started at the business we were serving 14m customers a week, and now we’re serving 24m a week. That’s a great achievement,” enthused Mike Coupe. King insists the [...]
Aiming for the stars June 8, 2014 Annabel Palmer speaks to Jenny Biggam, media veteran and co-founder of the7stars AS the media landscape becomes ever more complex, media giants like Mindshare or OMD are having to look beyond the traditional recipe for success (small distribution networks, multiple revenue streams) towards greater innovation and efficiency. But Jenny Biggam, co-founder of the7stars (an independent [...]
The week in brief June 8, 2014 UK E&M market to be worth £64bn by 2018 According to PwC’s latest Global entertainment & media (E&M) outlook report, the UK E&M market is expected to grow by 3.1 per cent from 2013 to 2018 – to a value of £64bn in 2018. In 2013, Britain had the second largest E&M market in Europe, [...]
Tesco share price is falling after sales plummeted again June 4, 2014 Another set of falling sales figures from Tesco this morning. The UK supermarket giant has reported a 3.7 per cent drop in like-for-like sales – 3.8 per cent when including petrol. That does mark the store’s third drop in a row but is, however, better than the four per cent decline analysts were expecting. Revenues [...]