A fresh investigation by consumer group Which? makes headlines this morning after it revealed food giants and supermarkets are still shrinking the size of popular items. The Mail writes the companies were “adding insult to injury” by hiking the price. Everyday items in shopping baskets, from toothpaste to chocolate biscuits, are being reduced in size in what the paper calls a stealth price rise for customers. The Which? study found a packet of McVitie’s Digestives dark chocolate biscuits has decreased in size by just over 10% from 332g to 300g but the price in Tesco has increased from £1.59 to £1.69. Andrex had also cut the number of sheets on its standard toilet rolls from 240 to 221 sheets – an 8% fall, The Guardian and Telegraph noted. However, the price had remained roughly £2 for four rolls.
The first half results of Associated British Foods gets plenty of coverage with The Financial Times and The Times concentrated on Primark. The FT writes that like-for-like sales at the discount chain fell for the first time as a result of the strong US dollar. The Times says: “After years of seemingly unstoppable growth, Primark has suffered its first fall in sales in more than a decade, prompting its owner to hit back at suggestions that the discount fashion chain has passed its peak.” In a separate article, The Times’ Tempus shares column looks in more detail at ABF’s sugar business. “The future looks just a little bit sweeter for AB Foods”, the paper writes. The sugar business, which makes up 15% of the group, recorded sales of £843m with operating profits of £6m. The group hailed it as a good performance as a year earlier it made a loss of £3m because of challenging conditions in world sugar. The Telegraph says ABF CEO George Weston hit out at Government’s sugar tax. In the results, Weston said he “remained skeptical about whether [the sugar tax] would reduce obesity rates in the country”.
Increased demand for healthy vegetarian food helped drive another record year at Pret a Manger, with profits up 14.5% to £84.3m in 2015 (The Guardian). A growing appetite for avocados saw Pret’s customer get through five million last year, the chain’s fastest-growing ingredient, The FT noted. The Telegraph writes that fast-growing demand for breakfasts and coffees in the US had also helped revenues hit a record £676m last year.
A market report on Premier Foods in The Times says doubts about Mr Kipling left an “exceedingly bad taste”. “Though the FTSE 100 rallied to a fresh four-month high, investors’ appetite for Premier Foods was waning after a warning that the shares were worth considerably less than the recent bid offer,” the paper writes. Credit Suisse, one of four advisers to Premier during its talks with McCormick, cut its target price to 50p a share from 70p, a 23% discount to the McCormick’s 65p offer last month.
Finally, Unilever has claimed the top spot in Oxfam’s Behind the Brand’s campaign, which ranks 10 global brands according to their social and environmental policies (The Independent).
No comments yet