All Daily Bread articles – Page 136
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Comment & Opinion
Satisfaction not guaranteed
Asda today published its full-year results – or rather, the collection of cherry-picked factoids that passes for a breakdown of its financial performance. Sales were up 1.6% on a like-for-like basis in the fourth quarter, representing something of a turnaround from the slow-motion car-crash of last year.
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Comment & Opinion
GSCOP, bad cop
Fittingly, the Adjudicator has had an air of mystery about it ever since the grocery ombudsman was given its rather Kafka-esque name last AugustClicks:4 (CTR 2.96%).
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Comment & Opinion
Nocton's technical knockout
They say letter-writing is a lost art (although subscribers to thegrocer.co.uk can receive their Daily Bread via snail-mail on the back of a postcard of Crawley if they really want to).
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Comment & Opinion
The Kiddi's alright
So the City rumour mill was right – sort of. Morrisons was looking to get its hands on an online retailer after all – just not Ocado, much to the disappointment of many speculative shareholders in the posh food retailer.
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Comment & Opinion
Fair's fare
Last week the papers were up in arms over the news that a shopworker in Essex had been arrested after helping herself to a pile of spoiled stock thrown out by Tesco following a power cut.
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Comment & Opinion
Tug of Laura
They used to say you really never leave the KGB. Or the CIA, for that matter. Apropos of nothing, it’s hard to think of many people who’ve jumped ship early from Tesco in recent times and gone on to genuinely bigger and better things.
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Comment & Opinion
George of the retail jungle
So George Davies is said to be launching a clothing line with a Yorkshire-based supermarket chain.
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Comment & Opinion
Doom and boom
Spring may not yet be in the air but two of the drinks trade’s heavyweight players today kicked off seasonal offensives. Months of suitably wintry doom and gloom surrounding beer prices and the challenges faced by Britain’s biggest beer brands were punctuated first by The Grocer’s world exclusive that Stella ...
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Comment & Opinion
Milestones and millstones
Ocado boss Tim Steiner was today trumpeting a “landmark year” for the online retailer. He’s not wrong. The long-awaited flotation got away despite more prophecies of doom than an Old Testament epic.
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Comment & Opinion
Asda's running battle
Football fans will know that today is transfer deadline day – and with Liverpool seemingly poised to splash out £35m on pony-tailed carthorse Andy Carroll, there’s surely a suitably clumsy metaphor to be found about shopping around for value.
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Comment & Opinion
Family misfortunes
Snow returned to Grocer Towers today, albeit briefly – but the chill that ran down many a back earlier this week had nothing to do with the mercury falling. GDP shrank by 0.5% in the previous quarter, we learned on Tuesday, confounding predictions – or maybe they were just hopes ...
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Comment & Opinion
Moment of clarity
North of the border devotees of Robert Burns were last night raising a glass of something medicinal to toast the great poet and help wash down the traditional feast of sheep’s stomach and mashed turnip. Maybe some subversive types even sparked a cigar.
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Comment & Opinion
Shake your moneymaker
They say money talks and bullsh—er, other stuff walks. We saw on Friday evening how cash is king, when Ranjit Boparan drove a coach and horses through the proposed Essenta tie-up. Specifically, a coach filled with money (reportedly lent to him by the good folk at Goldman Sachs).
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Comment & Opinion
Above the argy-bargy
Sometimes it’s better to rise above it. The unseemly spat over pricing between some of the UK’s largest supermarkets rolled on this week, with Tesco unveiling new press ads having a pop at Asda’s 10% price guarantee.
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Comment & Opinion
The battle for Northern's soul
The time has nearly run out for Ranjit Boparan to put up or shut up and clarify whether he intends to table a bid for Northern Foods.
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Comment & Opinion
When good men do nothing
They say evil prospers when good men do nothing. And by doing very little today, the coalition has managed to upset almost everybody. Retailers in England and Wales are to be banned from selling booze below the cost of duty plus VAT.
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Comment & Opinion
Unhappy Mondays
Today is Blue Monday. That’s the most depressing day of the year, if you believe ‘research’ paid for by online travel agents that want you to book some winter sun. Perhaps that explains the tetchiness in the weekend’s exchanges between Tesco and Asda over the latter’s 10% pledge.
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Comment & Opinion
Ice, lemons and hot pork bellies
Last weekend in the FA Cup there was the usual talk about bog-like lower-league pitches being “a great leveller”. Top clubs don’t fancy having lumps kicked out of them on swampy pitches, so there’s more chance of a giantkilling.
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Comment & Opinion
Justin's cracking Christmas
No wonder Justin King was looking so pleased with life at today’s 90-minute briefing in Holborn, attended by The Grocer’s newshounds.
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Comment & Opinion
Bright Youngs things
Hyperbole is without a doubt the worst crime any retail chief can commit. Well, perhaps that’s an exaggeration. Dalton Philips avoided too many verbal fireworks when he said Morrisons was “a nose ahead of the market” after reporting a solid, if unspectacular, 1% rise in like-for-likes for the Christmas period.