Booker is raising awareness of its Happy Shopper own label by sponsoring international and county cricket umpires this summer. Hibernia Foods ­ the Mr Brain's to Entenmanns group ­ has announced a £30m financial restructuring package to prepay its US loan notes and help fund future European acquisitions. Sales in Naafi's 180 Spar stores rose 13% to £90m in the past year. The operation made a profit of £2m. Aggressive price promotions resulted in food retailers north of the border seeing their like for like sales slip 0.6% in April, says the Scottish Retail Consortium. Like for likes have now fallen by 1.3% in the February to April period. Safeway has urged 3,000 of its suppliers to register with the Close Call online database so that it has up to date emergency contact information in the event of a product recall. Scottish Co-op society Scotmid has reported an operating profit of £4.4m on sales of £204m for the year to January 29. Whitbread is believed to be close to finalising the sale of its brewing assets to Interbrew, the Belgian group best known for its Stella Artois brand. Bass is now expected to sell its brewing operations to Heineken. Carlsberg is also believed to be sniffing around Bass. Bernard Matthews is planning to buy back the company that bears his name by acquiring the 58% of shares he does not already own. Online retailer SimplyOrganic is offering its regular customers free national delivery. Private equity group Doughty Hanson has emerged as the favourite to buy the RHM food business from Tomkins for £1.2bn. Nestlé has granted Osem UK the rights to distribute its Maggi products in this country. Nisa has launched its new promotions package for retailers with the publication of three magazines focusing on frozen and chilled, groceries and impulse, and licensed goods. A partnership between the Welsh Development Agency's Food Directorate and Somerfield has resulted in more than 60 lines from Welsh producers being listed in 51 of the multiple's stores. Scientists at the Public Health Laboratory Service admit they made a mistake in identifying Tesco organic mushrooms as having E.coli. The multiple was forced to withdraw the mushrooms, sparking a media onslaught on organics. Sales at Lothian Borders & Angus Co-operative Society were virtually unchanged at £108.7m in the year to January 29. The society ­ which is building a £3m superstore in Langholm ­ made an operating profit of £3.57m. A special general meeting of the National Grocers' Benevolent Fund has been called for June 14 starting at 2.30pm at the Posthouse Hotel in Guildford, Surrey. US drinks group Brown-Forman is taking a stake in Glenmorangie as part of a plan to raise sales of the whisky in overseas markets. Glenmorangie sales rose 12% to £50.4m in the year to March 31. Profit fell from £7.3m to £6.4m. {{NEWS }}

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