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Well as I have been saying Schweppes was on the market and being spied from Japan. Got the country right but the company wrong. Drinks giant Asahi Breweries has bought the Schweppes business from Cadbury PLC.

This is subject to The Coca Cola Company not using its last offer rights, which it holds for 90 days.  It would be a hard road for the guys from Atlanta to get the business with the ACCC having a close look at the Schweppes bottling arrangements for the Pepsi brand.

The cash sale price of the business is £550 million ($A1.19 billion), which is sightly more than market expectations.

Asahi Breweries

The Age reported that:

BusinessDay believes that unsuccessful bidders included Suntory, the Australian-based Coca-Cola Amatil (which has Coca-Cola as a 30 per cent shareholder) and P&N Beverages.

So I was close but no cigar.

Tim

Posted under Uncategorized

Another month’s results from the ACCC’s Grocery Choice web site and Woowlorths is now the cheapest. So what does this mean?  The front page of the web site tells us the news;

• Woolworths cheapest on total grocery basket in 59 of 61 regions (up from 21 last month)
• Nationally, the price difference between Coles, Woolworths and Independents has narrowed
• ALDI cheapest on basic staple products

By the way this is what they do;(from the web site)

“Price information is obtained from an independent monthly survey of approximately 500 products from 600 supermarket outlets across Australia. The results of each monthly survey will be made available on the GROCERY choice website on the first business day of the following month.” Read More…

Posted under News, Retailers

So it’s been confirmed that Mitre 10 is looking at its options, as extracted from the AFR on the 24th Sept 08;

“Hardware group, Mitre 10, staged its annual convention on 23 September 2008. The organisation’s CEO, Bernie Bicknell, claimed that in the past 12 months, a lack of funds prevented the company from purchasing about half a dozen strongly performing stores. Bicknell reaffirmed that Mitre 10 is considering options such as an outright trade sale or a capital injection”

Well I believe it may well be Metcash who is the preferred bidder or injector. The complex franchise structure of Mitre 10 is proving a bit too much of a challenge for the Corporate Heads at Woolworths and they are getting cold feet. Without ultimate control of the entity they think it will be too hard to turn around this loss making network. Metcash on the other hand has the buying experience and understands the challenges of dealing with individual owners at store level. Read More…

Posted under News

Hardware buying supermarkets, we have seen that, supermarkets investing in hardware, watch this space.

Mitre 10 has been struggling for the past decade to have an impact in the Hardware channel, particularly in metropolitan areas. The Australian Financial Review has reported that Mitre 10 and Woolworths are in discussions regarding a capital injection or outright purchase of entity.

The AFR also indicates that Mitre 10 will be holding a shareholders meeting during its National Convention next week on the Gold Coast. With the vast majority of shareholders in attendance this is an ideal opportunity to present a restructure or buyout proposal.

Hardware should not pose any ACCC issues for Woolworths as this is one of the few areas that WOW do not participate in in the Australian market.

Tim

Posted under Retailers