UK retailers hit by sharp drop in spending as inflation soars

Boost in demand in June on back of jubilee celebrations fails to prevent third successive fall

Britain’s retailers are suffering the sharpest drop in spending since the depths of the coronavirus pandemic as hard-pressed consumers tighten their belts as a result of soaring inflation.

The monthly health check from the British Retail Consortium (BRC) reported a third successive drop in activity as the cost of living crisis continued to bite.

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UK supermarkets urged to stop selling Parma ham from EU caged sows

Animal welfare groups find sows in Europe forced to spend weeks in cages so small they can only stand and lie down

Animal welfare campaigners are calling on UK supermarkets to stop selling premium ham, including Parma, produced in “sow stalls” on EU farms.

An undercover investigation conducted by Compassion in World Farming (CWF), an animal welfare campaign group, found that sows are forced to spend many weeks in cages so small they can only stand up and lie down.

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Sainsbury’s boss warns UK living costs squeeze will ‘only intensify’

UK’s second-biggest supermarket says it will invest £500m to keep prices low as Marks & Spencer echoes outlook for coming months

The inflationary pressure on households will “only intensify” through the rest of this year, the boss of Sainsbury’s has warned as he said the supermarket would invest £500m in attempting to keep prices low.

The dour sentiment was echoed by the chair of Marks & Spencer, Archie Norman, who told shareholders at the retailer’s annual general meeting on Tuesday that there was a “coming winter in consumer demand”.

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UK shop prices hit highest rate of inflation since 2008

Prices up 3.1% on a year ago, with fresh food prices in particular rising sharply, figures show

Shop prices have hit their highest rate of inflation in almost 14 years as businesses grapple with soaring supply chain costs and a cut in household spending, figures from the British Retail Consortium (BRC) show.

They were up 3.1% on a year ago in June, up from 2.8% in May – the highest rate of inflation since September 2008, according to the BRC-NielsenIQ shop price index.

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Ocado aims to raise £575m from investors to fund tech arm expansion

Firm wants to ‘invest in innovation at faster pace’ and help clients as online grocery market grows

Ocado is aiming to raise £575m from investors to fund the expansion of its technology arm, which enables overseas retailers to sell groceries online. It has also agreed a new £300m credit facility with a syndicate of international banks.

Ocado said it wanted the cash to “invest in innovation at a faster pace” and help its clients, which include the US supermarket chain Kroger and the French grocer Casino, to accelerate the shift to online shopping.

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Primark to trial UK click and collect in move into online sales

Customers will be able to order from about 2,000 items online, including children’s clothes

Primark will trial a click-and-collect service in the UK, in the budget fashion chain’s first significant move into online shopping.

The high street retailer will launch the trial at 25 stores in the north-west of England by the end of the year, but said it would only cover children’s clothing and accessories, as the company – owned by Associated British Foods (ABF) – tries to draw more families into its stores.

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Revlon files for bankruptcy in US after supply chain trouble and surging costs

Cosmetics company hopes to refinance and keep trading, saying demand for products remains strong

Revlon, the 90-year-old multinational beauty company, has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in the US, weighed down by debt load, disruptions to its supply chain network and surging costs.

The New York-based company said that on court approval, it expects to receive $575m (£469m) in financing from its existing lenders, which will allow it to keep its day-to-day operations running.

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Morrisons mistakenly lists £2.50 whisky

The retailer identified the pricing error on its website before any bottles were sold

Mark Twain reputedly said “Too much of anything is bad, but too much good whisky is barely enough”.

Online shoppers at the supermarket Morrisons came close to testing his theory when the retailer accidentally priced bottles of a Scotch whisky at just £2.50, a 93% discount from its usual price of £36.

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UK food price rises could hit 15% over summer, report says

Ukraine war, China lockdowns and Brexit help push up inflation, with products that rely on wheat worst hit

Food price rises in the UK could hit 15% this summer – the highest level in more than 20 years – with inflation lasting into the middle of next year, according to a report.

Meat, cereals, dairy, fruit and vegetables are likely to be the worst affected as the war in Ukraine combines with production lockdowns in China and export bans on key food stuffs such as palm oil from Indonesia and wheat from India, the grocery trade body IGD warns.

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Missguided will not refund customers, administrators confirm

Shoppers air frustration at UK fast-fashion retailer’s failure to honour refunds after falling into insolvency

Customers of the collapsed fast fashion retailer Missguided will not receive refunds for returns, administrators of the business have confirmed.

It comes after the Manchester-based company fell into insolvency last month after racking up millions of pounds in outstanding payments to creditors.

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‘A gift from God’: Binley Mega Chippy owner basks in TikTok fame

Kamal Gandhi, 70, and his Coventry chip shop became a sensation after its name was turned into a catchy song

It has been two weeks since his Coventry chip shop became a TikTok sensation drawing in crowds from around the country, and 70-year-old Kamal Gandhi is exhausted.

He has had to take on and train four new staff members, ensure a continuous supply of stock to deal with hundreds of new customers and help manage the long queues snaking down the road outside the now world famous Binley Mega Chippy.

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Pakistani garment workers left destitute and starving after Missguided collapse

Fashion retailer’s suppliers in Pakistan have sacked hundreds without pay, as invoices for completed orders remain unpaid

Hundreds of garment workers in Pakistan making clothing for collapsed fast fashion brand Missguided say they have been left destitute and starving after not receiving salaries for more than four months.

The workers, who typically earn between £100 and £160 a month, say that despite not being paid they have continued working even as the Manchester-based retailer went into administration, with suppliers claiming the company owes them millions of pounds for clothing already completed and shipped.

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Reliance Industries and Apollo Global Management in £5bn bid for Boots

Mukesh Ambani teams up with US private equity fund, with Walgreens expected to retain minority stake

The Indian billionaire Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Industries has teamed up with the US private equity fund Apollo Global Management to make a £5bn bid for the UK’s Boots chain.

The US group Walgreens, which has controlled the pharmacy and beauty retailer since 2012, is expected to keep a minority stake under the deal.

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Klarna criticised for chaotic handling of job cuts

UK employees said they were ‘blindsided’ by the Swedish firm’s announcement

Sacked staff have criticised the buy now pay later firm Klarna for its chaotic handling of job cuts, including in the UK, and questioned the chief executive’s decision to publicise a list of fired staff who are now scrambling for work.

UK employees affected by the cuts told the Guardian they felt “blindsided” by the Swedish firm’s announcement last week, when its co-founder and boss Sebastian Siemiatkowski revealed it would be cutting more than 700 of its 7,000-plus global staff, including some hired just weeks earlier.

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JD Sports boss Peter Cowgill quits with immediate effect

Outspoken leader thought to have resisted board’s attempts to split the roles of chair and chief executive

The boss of JD Sports has stepped down with immediate effect just months after the retailer was fined more than £4m for breaching the competition regulator’s rules with clandestine meetings with a takeover target.

The company said Peter Cowgill, the outspoken chair and chief executive officer of JD, who has led the group since 2004, would be temporarily replaced as chief executive by Kath Smith, its senior independent director who spent 25 years as managing director of the Adidas and Reebok brands.

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More than a fifth of Britons struggling as grocery price inflation hits 13-year high

Nine in 10 people say they are worried about the rising price of their shop, Kantar survey finds

More than a fifth of households in Great Britain say they are struggling to make ends meet as the price of the weekly grocery shop rises 7%, the highest level of inflation in 13 years.

Nine in 10 people say they are worried about the rising price of groceries, according to the market research group Kantar, putting the issue in second place behind concerns about energy bills as the cost of living crisis hits families hard.

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Trader Joe’s workers push to unionize amid wave of organizing efforts

Branch in Hadley, Massachusetts, would be the first unionized store out of more than 530 locations in the US

Organizers have begun a unionization campaign at the upscale supermarket chain Trader Joe’s after workers at a branch in Hadley, Massachusetts, announced they were forming a union and intend to file a petition with the National Labor Relations Board to hold an election.

It would be the first unionized Trader Joe’s store out of more than 530 locations in the US. Workers are organizing independently, citing the similar framework of the Amazon Labor Union, which is not affiliated with traditional, established labor unions.

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Pay gap in UK between bosses and workers likely to widen in 2022

After narrowing during pandemic, analysis suggests FTSE 350 CEOs will collect 63 times average median pay at their companies

The gap between the pay of bosses and employees will widen again this year after narrowing during the pandemic, research suggests.

FTSE 350 chief executives are expected to collect 63 times the average median pay of workers at their companies , according to the High Pay Centre thinktank, which campaigns for fairer pay structures.

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M&S chair attacks ‘pointless’ post-Brexit rules for Northern Ireland

Archie Norman backs UK plans to scrap parts of protocol, saying lorries require ‘700 pages of documents’

The chairman of Marks & Spencer has backed government plans to override parts of the Northern Ireland protocol, saying that some food exported south of the border now requires 700 pages of customs documents, partly written in Latin.

Archie Norman, a former Conservative MP, called on the UK government and EU to come to an agreement, saying the rules for sending food between them were “highly bureaucratic and pretty pointless” given that British food standards were in line with or higher than those of Brussels.

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UK preparing for Queen’s platinum jubilee with thousands of events

Celebrations to be spread out across country during extended bank holiday weekend but royal family urge more to get involved

The UK is preparing to celebrate the platinum jubilee weekend in style, with 1,458 public events and 1,775 street parties or private events officially registered to take place from 2 to 5 June.

The celebrations are spread out across the country, with 240 in and around London, 208 around Manchester, 133 near Birmingham, 98 in Scotland – including four in the Orkneys and one on the Isle of Lewis – 21 in Northern Ireland and two in Guernsey.

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