Co-op shelves plans for online grocery service August 8, 2014 THE CO-OPERATIVE Group has shelved plans to join its rivals and launch an online grocery service just months after unveiling a plan to turn around its embattled food business. The mutual began trialling click-and-collect service – where customers can pick up groceries ordered online – at a store in Stockport in November, but has now [...]
Car review: The Lexus NX 300h is an eco-friendly drive that doesn’t skimp on gadgets October 13, 2014 Pulling away in a car on a wave of silence still doesn’t make sense in my brain. I’ve driven plenty of electric and hybrid cars, but every time I gently move off from a standstill on a peacefully eerie surge of current-fed calm, it still gets me. I’m experiencing this soothing yet unsettling [...]
Sport Comment: World Cup has been huge credibility boost for women’s rugby August 17, 2014 IT IS the nature of our sporting world that football is the rich man from whose table every other sport has to eat the scraps, and so amid all the hoopla in the week of the resumption of the Premier League it has been particularly bad luck for English cricket and British athletics that their [...]
Saga tests water with customers for market float January 20, 2014 SAGA, the over-50s insurer, has appointed Bank of America Merrill Lynch to help plot a share offering for its 2.7m customers as part of a mooted £3bn stock market float. The cruise ship specialist, which is led by boss Andrew Goodsell, will test the water with customers this week to gauge interest in the plan [...]
Small is beautiful: Why the age of big business and big government is over October 29, 2014 THE CORPORATION has never been less fashionable. Politicians are falling over themselves to tell voters how they will constrain, bully and regulate large companies. It makes sense. The polls tell them that trust in the corporate world is at derisory levels. A recent Populus survey found 61 per cent wanted the government to be tougher [...]
Inflation eats up £80bn over last five years June 7, 2015 UK SAVERS have seen the purchasing power of their savings lose £80bn since 2010, Henderson Global Investors said today. Since then, interest rates paid on cash savings have been outstripped by inflation. Around half of the UK’s collective wealth, or £729bn, is invested in cash accounts, with the overall average interest rate paid on this [...]
Football Comment: Identity: City have it, United in dire need of it August 27, 2014 CONFESSION time: I must admit I did not think Manchester City would get stronger this season, given their modest summer business, but after just two games I may have to eat my words. The champions could easily have dropped points at Newcastle or at home to Liverpool but have hit the ground running, won two [...]
How Google and Amazon workers keep their focus September 15, 2014 Harriet Green examines the Two Pizza Rule and the benefits of workplace mindfulness. Distractions can be crippling to productivity. Gloria Mark of the University of California found that, on average, office workers are distracted every 11 minutes. And worse, it takes 25 minutes to return to a task once you’ve wandered onto something else. [...]
How to make Blanchette’s perfect beef fillet October 15, 2014 Tom Storrar, head chef at Soho's Blanchette, on his beef fillet with courgettes, sarladaise potatoes and green peppercorn sauce I’ve been at Blanchette since the restaurant opened late last year. The beef in this recipe is a new dish on the menu; a restaurant version of steak and chips. I chose it because many [...]
Reach for the Isle of Skye for a bracing winter weekend away December 21, 2014 The island off the west coast of Scotland has a rugged charm during the colder months – and the food is first class. My heart is yearning to thee, O Skye! Dearest of Islands! There first the sunshine gladdened my eye, On the sea sparkling”. So wrote Scottish poet Alexander Nicolson about the largest [...]