There was a lot of coverage this morning and overnight surrounding Unilever’s first quarter trading update with sales down 0.9% to £12.7bn although underlying sales were up 3%. The Mail focussed on CEO Fernando Fernandez’s maiden address as the boss of the consumer goods giant in which he claimed the business’ turnaround plans were moving at pace and that it was on track to hit its latest annual targets.
Meanwhile The Standard led on Unilever’s revelation that it had so far axed around 6,000 jobs this year. The turnaround plan includes an overall target of removing 7,500 roles as it looks to make savings of £683.9m.
This morning Bloomberg UK zeroed in on Unilever’s assertion that Ben & Jerry’s is not for sale. Speculation around the brand’s future has mounted following reports that its founder Ben Cohen is lining up investors as part of a bid to buy it back. Unilever is continuing to work on a plan to separate out its ice-cream operations, which include Ben & Jerry’s and Magnum into a standalone business known as The Magnum Ice Cream company from 1 July.
There was concerning news breaking on Sky News yesterday evening as it reported that almost 1,000 jobs were under threat at The Original Factory Shop. Maintaining the roles depends on landlords accepting new plans drawn up by TOFS’s new owners Modella Capital, to renegotiate rents on 88 of the retailer’s 178 stores.
The Post Office Horizon scandal continues to draw headlines with the BBC reporting today that the Post Office has paid more than £600m of public money to continue using the faulty Horizon IT system from Fujitsu despite deciding to get rid of it more than 10 years ago.
The Guardian meanwhile has picked up on the latest troubling crime retail figures. In a story also covered by The Grocer, the number of shoplifting offences recorded by police in England and Wales has risen to the highest level on record. Last year saw a 20% increase to 516,971 in shoplifting incidents reported by forces across to UK.
No comments yet