Whitbread faces increasing pressure to pursue a demerger amid speculation that activist investor Elliott Advisors is preparing to buy further shares, writes The Times (£). The revelation that Elliott Advisors had accrued a 6% stake in Whitbread propelled the shares 7.3% higher on Monday to close at 4,218p. Lombard in the Financial Times (£) pours over prospects for Whitbread following the disclosure. In another article, the Financial Times (£) says the stakeholding increases the likelihood the owner of Costa Coffee and Premier Inn will be broken up. The Daily Telegraph says that along with the arrival of Sachem Head, another activist investor, on the share register, a split of Whitbread is “all but inevitable”. The Daily Mail says Elliott is believed to think as much as £3bn of value could be unlocked by listing Costa Coffee separately.

Diageo plans to invest £150m in scotch whisky visitor attractions over three years, reports the Financial Times (£). They will centre on a new “immersive experience” in Edinburgh celebrating Johnnie Walker. The group has got its inspiration from its Guinness Storehouse site in Dublin – which had 1.7m visitors last year. The Times (£) says that where Harry Potter led, Johnnie Walker is set to follow. The Daily Telegraph reports that part of the expenditure will go on refurbishing visitor attractions at Diageo’s 12 whisky distillery visitor centres. An opinion piece in The Guardian says it is the “experience economy” that offers a future for town centres which they must grab.

Jamie Oliver’s Australian restaurants have been placed in the hands of voluntary administrators. Five of them, trading as Jamie’s Italian have been sold to Hallmark in an eleventh-hour rescue deal. A sixth has closed immediately (The Guardian).

“Surf and turf” online shoppers who abandon their shopping baskets are costing retailers £18bn of potential sales annually, according to a Barclaycard survey (The Daily Telegraph). Shoppers are more fickle when buying online, it found. Some 41% opted out of a transaction at a virtual checkout in the past year, compared with 24% who had walked away from an in-store purchase.

Goldman Sachs analysts have downgraded US dairy giant Dean Foods, sending the shares to their lowest level since October 2011. The Financial Times (£) notes that a push by food retailers into their own private label milk brands has contributed to pricing pressure on milk.

UK retailers saw a 6% drop in shopper numbers in March, reports The Guardian. Springboard, which compiled the footfall data, said High streets were the hardest hit, with visitor numbers down 8.6%, but shopping centres and retail parks also experienced declines of 4.8% and 1.8% respectively. At the same time, figures from Visa showed the biggest fall in quarterly consumer spending since the last three months of 2012 - also partly blamed on the “Beast from the East”, reports Sky News.

US retail sales rose for the first time this year with a better-than- expected rebound last month that offered some reassurance that a slowdown at the start of the year was just a blip, reports the Financial Times (£). Headline sales grew 0.6% per cent month on month to $494.6bn in March, from a 0.1 per cent drop in February, a survey of analysts by Thomson Reuters shows.

World Trade Organisation director-general Roberto Azevêdo has warned at the Commonwealth Business Forum in London that merely the “possibility” of a trade war between the US and China his hitting the entire global economy (The Times (£)).

JD Wetherspoon has broken with the social media clique and has closed its accounts, saying that Twitter, Facebook and Instagram encourage compulsive behaviour (The Times (£)). A spokesman for the chain told Sky News: “We’ve noticed a lot of MPs get trolled and some receive some nasty comments and the company doesn’t like what’s going on - we don’t like the general climate of social media.”

Wetherspoon’s chose Twitter to announce the decisions, which critics called a publicity stunt. It said recent concerns about the misuse of personal data had also influenced its decision (The Daily Telegraph). Chairman Tim Martin said it was “going against conventional wisdom that these platforms are a vital component of a successful business”. The Independent says “it’s a rich irony given that the way Mr Martin expresses his views could easily be said to encourage the very sort of troll he takes aim at.”

A shareholder revolt is brewing over Unilever’s plans to move its headquarters from London to Rotterdam. Unilever said it would continue to engage with “a small group of shareholders” whose holding it said might be directly affected by its proposal. The Daily Mail

Timpson’s profits fell from £20.2m to £12.6m in the year to September 30, 2017 on turnover of £260m, up from £205m the previous year. The Daily Mail reports the company expanded in all divisions including dry-cleaning, photos, watch and shoe repairs and key cutting. It bought Johnson and Jeeves to add to its Morrisons dry-cleaning business. It also provide dry-cleaning to 180 Waitroses. Its photo business includes 281 self-service photo kiosks in Tesco outlets.

Sky News reports the Uber’s Latin American chief Rodrigo Arevalo is to lead the company’s fight against food delivery rivals Deliveroo and Just Eat by taking the helm of its European restaurant app business.

Jose Sette, executive director of the International Coffee Organisation, has criticised a US judge’s ruling on 28 March that Starbucks and other companies had failed to show there was no significant risk from acrylamide, a carcinogen produced in the coffee roasting process. Reuters says the coffee industry is worried that the push for cancer labels may spread.

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