MBS Intelligence

Retail

Exit through the gift shop: desperately seeking differentiation

On a cold and crisp day last Sunday, I experienced London at its best. My first port of call was the Royal Academy to see two world-renowned British artists: Antony Gormley followed by Lucian Freud. Both exhibitions...

Australia: leading the way

I have just returned from visiting our clients in Australia and New Zealand. The New Zealanders were still reeling from their loss against England in the Rugby semi-finals – so it was very easy to move the...

‘Protect the magic and modernise the rest’: walking Marks…

On a beautiful, sunny London day this week, I made my way down to Clapham to meet up with Stuart Machin, Managing Director, Food, M&S. The venue is the newly renovated M&S store and he is giving me a tour to...

A new retail

Over the last few months I have been spending a lot of time on high streets up and down the UK. Maybe others have noticed the transition over many years – but, for the first time, I observed a massive shift from...

Some reasons for stores

As of late, we’ve seen many articles chronicling the demise of brick-and-mortar stores, painting a dim picture of the future of traditional retail. We don’t believe that the only way forward for stores is a complete...

Strategy Consultants: Your Time Has Come!

What do newly appointed Reckitt Benckiser CEO, Laxman Narasimhan, Sheryl Sandberg (COO at Facebook), Vittorio Colao (former CEO of Vodafone), Indra Nooyi (former CEO of PepsiCo, now on the Board of Amazon), John Donahoe...

Jo Whitfield: The Northern Star of grocery retail

Every year, when the time comes for me to nominate candidates for the Veuve Clicquot Business Woman of the Year Awards, I live in hope that someone doing something extraordinary will emerge. This year, though, I was...

Make me happy: wellbeing in the workplace

Over the past few years, a growing number of businesses have begun to focus on wellbeing. Continued research in this space has created an ever evolving understanding of what drives the productivity of staff. There...

The Fruit and Veg King

There are certain things that have become part of my London history. Like the first time I went into the Harrods Foodhall and experienced the visual feast of retail theatre at its best, or the first time, in 1979 on...

Latest Retail News

First-quarter company sales rise 8% at H&M In the three months to 29 February, the fashion retailer saw an 8% uptick in sales, leading to £2.2bn in profits. Read more.

Cath Kidson set to call in administrators According to reports, the lifestyle retailer has filed a notice of intention to appoint administrators. Read more.

Superdrug launches same-day delivery service The health and beauty retailer has introduced a courier delivery service for urgent orders, to help customers who are social distancing get the products they need quickly. The scheme is available to customers within an eight mile radius of over 300 stores. Read more.

Primark to furlough majority of its 30,000 staff Alongside this move, directors at Primark's owner Associated British Foods have announced that they will be cutting their pay by 50%. Read more.

Aldi begins to ease product restrictions The discounter is lifting its rationing measures on beers, wine and spirits as well as nappies in all its stores. At the same time, Aldi has announced that it is extending its immediate payments scheme to include non-merchandise suppliers. Read more.

Morrisons’ shop floor staff have annual bonus tripled The retailer is thanking its staff by increasing their bonuses threefold. Full-time employees will earn a bonus of £1,050 - compared to around £350 that they received last year. Read more.