Friday 24 April 2015

Best Chocolate Ever?


New chocolate treat from Cadbury's is a hybrid of seven of their most popular chocolate bars. Designed with help from food artist Prudence Staite, the "Cadbury Dairy Milk Spectacular 7" bar contains squares of Caramel, Whole Nut, Fruit & Nut, Turkish Delight, Oreo, Daim bar and the classic Dairy Milk. Sadly, the 200g "sharing" bar (ha) won't be appearing on any shelves near you soon, as only 50 bars have been produced. Chocolate fans can put themselves in the running for a bar by looking out for and retweeting a competition post on the @CadburyUK Twitter feed.
Cadburys Sepctacular Bar

Thursday 23 April 2015

Milifandom vs Cameronettes

Ed Miliband has developed an unlikely fanbase of smitten teenage girls, after a 17-year-old student declared admiration for the Labour leader on Twitter and prompted a flood of replies from other young women.A student, known only as Abby, caused a Twitter storm after declaring herself leader of the #milifandom – a group of enthusiastic Ed Miliband admirers. Fandoms are usually reserved for the likes of Justin Bieber and One Direction, but the #milifandom hashtag has been trending, with scores of young females sharing their affection for the leader. Abby says the Milifandom, which started last week, is “a movement against the distorted media portrayal of Ed”. Since then, she has reached 12,000 followers on Twitter with tweeters using the hashtag to express their support. One tweeter described having an “unexplainable emotional connection” to the Labour leader, while others posted pictures of the politician with a crown of flowers.

Every Loss Hurts

Tesco has reported the worst results in its history with a record statutory pre-tax loss of £6.4bn for the year to the end of February. That compares with annual pre-tax profit of £2.26bn a year earlier. It is the biggest loss suffered by a UK retailer and one of the largest in the country's corporate history. Around £4.7bn of the losses were the result of the fall in property value of its UK stores, 43 of which it said would close earlier this month. He added: "The results we have published today reflect a deterioration in the market and, more significantly, an erosion of our competitiveness over recent years." He said that he expected conditions in the coming financial year to remain challenging.


Sainsburys App

Sainsburys are currently developing a new smartphone app which will allow customers to create shopping lists a t home, guide shopers to their chosen products, scan the items and pay for them without the need to visit  a checkout. A trial of the technology is expected in the next couple of months. Shoppers can create a list by scanning packs at home or searching for a brand or product. When they enter the store the products will appear as dots on a map of the store. They scan and pack their items into their trolleys and can pay using their card on the app. Full details of how it all works are yet to be relieved but this again shows how mobile technology continues to revolutionise the shopping experience.

Handbag Clinic


For handbags that look a little tired… a £200 pampering day at a luxury new spa, Customers are treating over-loved bags at Handbag Clinic in Chelsea. It was set up to rejuvenate high-end accessories in need of a face-lift or repair. The Company say they are now repairing bags worth £20,000 every day with famous clients include Imogen Thomas and Made in Chelsea stars.Customers can even take out ‘stain cover’ cover for one handbag for £4.95 or 15 handbags for £19.95 per month. One customer has £100,000 worth of bags on the service.

Monday 20 April 2015

Vote For...

Monday is the last possible day to register to vote in the 2015 general election. Anyone wishing to vote must be registered by midnight on Monday or they will not be able to. The Electoral Commission reports that 1.7 million applications to register to vote have been made in the past five weeks, most of them online.The last general election in 2010 saw a voter turnout of 65.1% across the UK, an increase on the two previous elections in 2005 and 2001 when turnout was 61.4% and 59.4% respectively. The 2001 election was the first time since World War Two that turnout had fallen below 70%. Maybe clips like the one below will get people talking more about politics.

McStrike

This is supposed to be a week of celebration at McDonald’s: it is 60 years since the ubiquitous fast-food restaurant opened its first franchise in Des Plaines, Illinois. Instead, the company is facing its most serious crisis, besieged by intense competition, concerned investors, disenchanted franchisees and disgruntled workers, thousands of whom joined a global “day of action” demanding higher wages.  The protests come even though McDonald’s newly installed chief executive, Steve Easterbrook from Watford, announced a pay rise for 90,000 of its restaurant workers at the start of this month, taking their hourly wage from $9.10 to $9.90 (£6.70).But rather than quell revolt the pay rise seems to have fuelled one – it is a long way short of the $15 an hour many have been calling for and actually ignores the wage demands of 750,000 staff in the US.

Frozen Out


Mattel has reported a big jump in losses as its core brand continues to face stiff competition from merchandise linked to Disney's highest-grossing animated movie, Frozen. The toy firm said Barbie sales plunged 14% in its first quarter to 31 March, with Mattel's loss before tax growing to $73.2m (£49.1m) from $9.4m (£6.3m) in the same period last year. The doll, whose history dates back to 1959, and its accessories have faced numerous challenges to its popularity from cautious consumer spending worldwide to the growth of device gaming and other rival products including Lego.

Very Pretty Green Deal

The former Oasis frontman, Liam Gallagher, is planning to raise funds for his upmarket men’s fashion label, Pretty Green, to expand around the UK and overseas. The singer launched the business in 2009 and has hired the investment bank Cantor Fitzgerald to look at his options. Interested private equity firms are said to be valuing the business at about £20m based on its underlying annual profits of about £2m. Although he has said in promotional material for the company that he does not consider it as a “business”, that would value Gallagher’s stake at around £6m. According to reports, Pretty Green had like-for-like sales growth of 33 per cent over the Christmas trading period. Accounts for the company show that it made a loss of £2m in 2013 on revenues of £10.9m.

Wednesday 1 April 2015

Year 11 Revision Resources

Looking for revision resources for GCSE Business? Follow the links below to find all the things you need to get prepared for your summer exams.

Amazon Dash

The online shopping giant announced a new hardware product called the Dash Button. It's a little hook, decorated with the name of a household brand, which customers can place on the wall and tap to automatically order (or more likely re-order) a specific product.The buttons are available immediately and they are free – though they are available invite-only, for Prime members.

Like Pies? Like Candles?

Pie Minister are set to diversify their range and start selling candles. If you like pies and the smell of pies you can now enjoy the smell of pies and meat without the temptation or guilt to eat it. With ‘freshly baked pie’ the new smell to sell houses, these new candles might just set the property world on fire; they’re hotly tipped to  topple current favourites  – baking bread and brewed coffee –  off the top spot.