Plans to pedestrianise London’s Oxford Street and make it the world’s top retail destination are the focus of a number of news reports this morning. The pedestrianisation proposals were set out on Tuesday by the city’s mayor Sadiq Khan, the Financial Times reports. He aims to make the street “the leading retail destination in the world” and address its need for “major regeneration” in the face of tough competition from online and the closure of department stores following the pandemic.
It would see traffic banned from the famous thoroughfare, with Khan using new powers from Labour to push through the long-thwarted pedestrianisation plans, says the Guardian.
The proposal is part of the mayor’s wider regeneration project with the potential for further changes towards Tottenham Court Road, according to Sky News.
Labour has said working from home boosts productivity and pledged to end the “culture of presenteeism”, the Times reports. In an interview with the newspaper, business secretary Jonathan Reynolds has said giving employees the right to work from home or ignore work emails and calls in the evening will make them more “motivated and resilient”.
Meanwhile, Amazon has ordered staff back into the office five days a week, with chief executive Andy Jassy telling them in a memo “it’s easier for our teammates to learn, model, practice, and strengthen our culture”, according to the Financial Times. The change is to come into effect from the start of next year in one of the strictest corporate crackdowns on remote working.
The giant online retailer is reversing a host of pandemic-era policies, with hot-desking to be scrapped and layers of management removed to cut back on unnecessary meetings, says the Times.
The founder and chief executive of Deliveroo sold shares worth almost £15 million a month after the food delivery group delivered its first profit, reports the Times. Will Shu sold 9.4 million shares between 12 September and 16 September, worth a total of £14.8 million.
The Mail Online also covers the Deliveroo story, reporting Shu still owns 95.8m shares, or 5.9% of the company, after the sale. Deliveroo said he sold the shares to ‘cover personal property investments’ and he does not participate in the company’s annual bonuses or long-term share award schemes.
The Mail Online has also covered the news on plant-based food brand Deliciously Ella’s sale to Swiss multinational Hero Group for an undisclosed sum. Read the full story on The Grocer.
London-listed e-commerce group THG will this week signal to investors it is exploring plans to spin off Ingenuity, its technology services arm, according to Sky News. The move could be announced as early as Tuesday to transform THG into a cash-generative dividend stock, Sky says it has learnt.
Post-Brexit checks on fruit and vegetables entering Britain from the EU have been delayed for the third time, amid concern from suppliers that they could lead to higher prices for shoppers, reports the Guardian. The government said checks on some fruit and vegetables such as celery and tomatoes, planned from 1 January, would now be postponed by six months to allow time to understand the impact.
Coffee prices have soared to a 13-year high thanks in part to rising demand in China for durian, the world’s smelliest fruit, according to the Telegraph. Its popularity has led Vietnamese farmers to switch robusta coffee crops out for durian because it is more profitable.
Marks & Spencer shares reached their highest level in more than seven years after analysts said its food division had hit a ‘sweet spot’, says a Mail Online market report. The retailer’s shares rose 2.9%, or 10.2p, to 361.4p, hitting a level not seen since June 2017, after analysts at RBC and Barclays both raised their target prices on the stock to 400p.
Administrators are on standby at the UK arm of TGI Fridays as the stricken restaurant chain reels from the collapse of plans to crack America, says a report in the Telegraph. Hostmore, the company that owns the UK franchise, is scrambling to sell its 87 restaurants, prevent the TGI Fridays brand from vanishing from the high street and save thousands of jobs.
Pret A Manger’s sales surged above £1bn last year as the UK sandwich chain ramped up expansion in international markets, reports the Financial Times. The company said its global franchise and own store sales in 2023 rose by a fifth to £1.1bn compared with the previous year.
In an analysis looking at incoming John Lewis Partnership chairman Jason Tarry, the Guardian’s Sarah Butler says the former Tesco executive will be hoping to accelerate the business’ turnaround in time to announce the first annual staff bonus in three years in March 2025.
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