Oxford Street has begun to bounce back, with the proportion of vacant shops down by 40% and almost a fifth of its troublesome candy and souvenir shops now closed.more
Waitrose was today crowned Britain's most expensive supermarket of the year - and Aldi the cheapest - in a price comparison of 43 shopping basket essentials. The news will boost sales at the German discounter which - along with rival Lidl - has seen a boom against the background of the cost of living crisis.more
British companies export equipment and machinery - including dual-use goods - worth hundreds of millions of pounds to third countries, from where they almost certainly go on to Russia, Sky News reported yesterday, based on trade figures.more
Biedronka is launching the sale of goods online, the chain announced on Thursday. 4,000 products are to be available in the e-store, it added, including dairy, meat, beverages and bread, among others.more
UK retail sales rebounded dramatically in January, with volumes rising by 3.4% after a disastrous December, offering hope that the UK’s recession will prove to be the shortest in history.more
Energy bills will fall in April by nearly £300 a year for a household using a typical amount of gas and electricity, a leading forecaster says. Consultancy Cornwall Insight has predicted a 15% drop, taking the typical annual bill to £1,635 - the lowest in more than two years.more
The Body Shop has collapsed into administration in the UK less than three months after it was taken over by a private equity company, in a move that puts more than 2,200 jobs at risk at the cosmetics chain.
Aurelius, the German company that bought The Body Shop for £207m in November, said it had been unable to revive the fortunes of the business after dismal trading over Christmas and new year.more
Courier firm Yodel has been snapped up in a last-minute rescue deal by a consortium led by rival operator Shift.
The parcel delivery giant, which had been owned by the Barclay family, secured the deal amid reports last week it was lining up potential administrators in case a takeover could not be agreed.more
Workers in the UK can expect less generous salary settlements this year, as employers rein in hiring plans, according to a report from the professional body for human resources.more
Delivery drivers for food-ordering platforms including Deliveroo and Uber Eats are staging a Valentine’s Day strike to demand better pay and conditions.more
Tesco has struck a deal to sell the bulk of its banking business to Barclays for £700m in a deal that will include the transfer of about 2,800 staff to the bank.more
The Co-op is installing in its supermarkets more than 200 secure till kiosks, locked cabinets for bottles of spirits and AI technology to monitor self-checkouts after a 44% surge in retail crime last year to about 1,000 incidents a day.more
The British opposition Labor Party yesterday withdrew from one of its flagship pre-election promises - allocating £28 billion annually to green investments. This is another case of British politicians making promises to fight climate change more realistic.more
German home appliance maker Miele posted record sales in the coronavirus years, but is now looking to cut costs as sales have declined. The company is reducing its workforce and moving the assembly of washing machines to Poland.more
Tesco has issued a four-week warning to customers to spend their Clubcard vouchers before they expire at the end of the month.
The supermarket giant warned Clubcard shoppers only have until 29 February to use £18m worth of Clubcard vouchers before they expire.more
The Treasury’s independent forecaster is to review the axeing of tax-free shopping for tourists, raising the possibility that a decision that leisure companies and retailers have blasted for deterring visitors and losing the UK billions in sales could be reversed.more
Asda says it plans to open 110 convenience stores this month as it aims to become the second-biggest grocery retailer in the UK.
The supermarket will only actually open one new site, and will convert 109 shops it bought from the Co-op and EG Group to its Asda Express brand.more
70 percent of restaurants in Italy will use artificial intelligence this year, according to the "Gastronomy and Technology" report. Some establishments already have robots that, for example, replace waiters in many activities.more
A fifth of post offices in the UK will stop selling lottery tickets and scratchcards, its operator has said.
Last year, the Post Office ended its group contract with the National Lottery, giving branches a choice on whether to stock the products.
Allwyn, which took over running the lottery days ago, said reasons ranged from religious beliefs to low sales.more
Months after announcing adverts would soon appear on its platform, Amazon Prime Video, the day has arrived.
In the US, ads arrived on January 29, but on Amazon.co.uk, we got an extra, blissful week of uninterrupted streaming on this side of the pond.more
Iran used accounts held at the banks in the UK to covertly move money around the world as part of a sanctions-evasion scheme backed by Iran's intelligence services. Lloyds and Santander UK provided accounts to British front companies secretly owned by a sanctioned Iranian petrochemicals company based in London, according to documents seen by the FT.more
Millions of barrels of fuel made from Russian oil are still being imported to the UK despite sanctions imposed over the war in Ukraine, research claims. A so-called "loophole" means Russian crude is refined in countries such as India and the products sold to the UK.more
Artificial Intelligence (AI) will not be a "mass destroyer of jobs" and human workers will learn to work with new technologies, the governor of the Bank of England has told the BBC.more
The package of 120 changes to regulations proposed by companies and industry organizations is intended to accelerate the development of the severely hampered electromobility sector, reports today "Rzeczpospolita", which has obtained access to the project on this matter.more
The UK construction sector is facing an “immensely difficult period” after 4,370 construction companies went bust over the past year, according to new data.more
