It’s been another busy week on The Grocer. 

The biggest drama of the week involves the fate of Southern Co-op, which felt compelled to issue a letter to members this week about the proposed merger with Co-op Group. “Concerned that some of the conversations being shared online did not reflect the full picture”, Southern CEO Ben Stimson and chair Janet Paraskeva didn’t sugarcoat it: “If the merger does not go ahead, the most likely outcome is that Southern Co-op will enter insolvency through administration,” they wrote. “This would put jobs at risk, lead to the loss of stores and negatively impact our suppliers.”’

Uncertainty over the conflict in the Middle East continues to cast a long shadow over global supply chains and dominated coverage of Sainsbury’s results, with analysts marking shares down amid concern about both the cautious profit guidance offered by CEO Simon Robers and the impact on its Argos GM business. Sainsbury’s strategy was also the subject of editor-in-chief Adam Leyland’s leader. You can read an extended version here.

While Sainsbury’s echoed Tesco’s insistence that there were no signs yet of inflation beyond fuel or changes in shopper behaviour, rice growers across Asia are warning that war-driven spikes in fuel and fertiliser prices are squeezing future supply, and the Rice Association said that at the very least the conflict “will add cost to rice production”, with further humanitarian implications inevitable in third-world countries, where it’s a staple food.

Eight weeks into the war chief reporter Ian Quinn has been tracking the growing industry anger at the continued lack of government action to help the industry cope. Among those giving evidence at a wide-ranging EFRA committee hearing this week was long-standing BRC heavyweight Andrew Opie – and as The Grocer revealed today, he is stepping down after 21 years as one of the most influential voices in the sector. His message to government was clear: the food and drink industry needs urgent help including a temporary halt to Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) payments.

The same Efra Committee also gave the Groceries Code Adjudicator a right grilling this week. Its chair, Liberal Democrat MP Alistair Carmichael, in a hearing this week brought up the case of sprout and brassica supplier John Clappison, who was at the heart of an extraordinary case against Aldi after he and his business partner took the discounter to court in 2024. Carmichael claims that when he came to Mark White for help, he was stonewalled and “told to go and speak to Aldi” despite facing £200k in legal bills and a High Court case that could cost millions. The committee quizzed White over his track record in policing supermarkets, with MPs criticising the GCA’s reluctance to intervene and attacking White’s “collaborative” approach with retailers. White defended his record but must be wondering what the future looks like inside the notoriously farmer-focused Defra.

Closer to home, British Apples & Pears executive chair Ali Capper has warned that without support on electricity bills for growers, supermarkets will have to rely more heavily on imports. Logistics operators are adding their voice to the growing chorus demanding action.

Still, it’s not all doom and disruption. The industry has rallied behind an ambitious new pact to tackle plastic and other harmful packaging. It looks to have gone a long way to overcoming resistance to the scheme’s eye-watering £42k joining fees. The pact is promising, among other things, to develop a full consumer reuse model within the first year.

Elsewhere, Morrisons has belatedly agreed to raise hourly pay to £13.11 – a whole penny ahead of Asda. And Asda itself has been busy hiring a new head of ambient and deploying AI within its legal team to speed up contract reviews.

The rise of ‘chicken wine’

One of the more positive stories this week: the seemingly unstoppable ascent of so-called ‘chicken wine’. Few outside the industry will know the name La Vieille Ferme, but everyone knows the label. And the unfussy, unpretentious French wine is still flying off the shelves, storming into the number one spot in the UK after going viral in 2024. Andrew Bayley, UK & Ireland MD at La Vieille Ferme’s owner Famille Perrin, spoke to drinks editor James Beeson about how the foundations for its success were laid.

The fate of novel foods in the UK has been in the spotlight in recent weeks owing to planned EU realignment. Last week we highlighted the predicament for lab-grown meat. This week The Grocer revealed that two of the UK’s leading CBD drinks brands have cut the amount of CBD in their drinks. It comes after the FSA encouraged businesses to meet its CBD provisional acceptable daily intake of 10 mg per day last summer. Trip and Goodrays are making all the right moves to appease the sloth-like FSA, which after more than half a decade has still failed to fully authorise any CBD products for sale. Unless the regulator speeds up, drinks editor James Beeson argues, CBD risks being left behind by more agile functional categories.

Elsewhere our product and supplier coverage has included detailed Focus On reports on crisps, nuts & bagged snacks, as well as canned goods. Focus On editor Niamh Leonard-Bedwell was also a talking head on the Channel 4 programme Battle of the Brands: Cadbury vs McVitie’s, which aired at 8pm last Friday. And senior retail reporter Stephen Jones was on Radio 4’s You & Yours talking about the rise of own label.

Looking ahead, the most-watching sporting event on the planet will be bigger than ever this year, providing retailers and brands with a marketing extravaganza. Features editor Dene Mullen has been digging into the deals and activations being lined up by brands – and how the tournament’s sprawling geography – spanning the US, Canada and Mexico – and late-night kick-offs will shape the nation’s habits.

And finally, closer to home but still on the subject of football, the headline grabber (certainly for Arsenal fans) was the arrival of Nando’s “viral” Bukayo Saka peri-peri sauce in retail. Fans have apparently been “begging to buy” it. Well, they need beg no more – it’s on shelves in Tesco and Asda, with more retailers to follow. Whether Saka’s form on the pitch will match his performance in the condiments aisle remains to be seen.

As ever, we would love to hear what you think. Drop me an email on sarah.vizard@thegrocer.co.uk with any feedback or stories you think we should be watching.

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