UK Business News

Shop Direct, the company that bought the famous Woolworths brand name in February have said that they have had over one million visitors to the newly launched woolworths.co.uk online shopping site during it’s first week of trading.

Although no actual sales figures have been given the company says that in the first week consumers had ordered more than a tonne of the famous woolworths pick & mix sweet selection, now referred to as ‘click & mix. Oddly, Cola bottles proving the most popular item in the confectionery store.

The death of Michael Jackson saw sales of the singers albums boost sales in the entertainment store, accounting for almost 70% of music sales on his own.

The company says that the Ladybird brand of children’s clothing has also been a big hit at the online store. Shop Direct will be hoping to build on the early interest shown on the new site as it introduces new products to it’s various online store areas over the coming months.

european smart meter

British Gas has said that it will be creating 2,600 new jobs between now and 2012 as the company introduces the new smart meter to UK homes.

The smart meter technology allows suppliers to record consumer usage of gas and electricity remotely while allowing customers to see exactly how much energy they are using. The government as said that it wants all homes in the UK to be fitted with the latest device by 2020.

The introduction of the smart meter will spell the end of an era for the meter readers who have to call on homes to check readings, it will also see the end of  estimated bills and consequently would reduce the manpower needed to man the call centres who deal with complaints over estimated bills.

British Gas says it will employ 2,100 engineers who will fit the meters and advise consumers of the best ways to make use of them, along with 400 support staff and over 100 managerial positions.

UK transport company National Express who won the franchise to run the East Coast railway London to Edinburgh line in August 2007, have announced that they will be handing the franchise back to the government as the recession has damaged it’s business plan to turn around the loss making business.

It will be the second time in three years that a company has had to give up the franchise, the last time saw the demise of GNER in 2007. The current agreement with National Express was due to run until 2015.

While National Express do not expect the termination to affect other rail franchises that it runs, the decision has clearly angered the Transport minister Andrew Adonis, who is not optimistic over the future of the transport company.

Adonis says he will set up a public company to continue running the aborted franchise and warned National Express that the government believes it may have  grounds to terminate other franchises held by the company.

“I think given the track record that National Express has demonstrated today, they’ll have some difficulty in getting into this business again,” said Adonis. Now that is rich coming from a minister of this current government.

In response, Ray O’Toole of National Express said he did not understand the statement from Adonis that the company could lose more franchises, National Express has not reneged on any commitments to the government to date, he added  “We are not in default of any of our franchise commitments. Services, passengers and staff will be unaffected by what is going on.”

National Express appear to be guilty only of taking on the franchise at the worst time possible, just as the financial crisis broke and they blame the current situation firmly on the recession.

Carphone Warehouse Group has won the approval of the European Union antitrust authorities, leaving the company free to go ahead with the proposed takeover of Internet service provider Tiscali UK.

The European Commission said in a statement today that the transaction would not impede competition and indeed would face stiff competition from other players in the UK market, not least from BT and Virgin.

Telecoms and retail group Carphone Warehouse will now proceed with the cash purchase Tiscali UK in a deal worth £236million, making them the biggest domestic broadband supplier in Britain, with 4.25million users.

Shop Direct have revived the Woolworths name as part of their online shopping experience. The UK’s biggest home shopping retailer bought the brand name in February.

Woolworths.co.uk went live online on Thursday, offering consumers the opportunity to purchase over half a million products, including children’s clothes and toys, video games, cd’s, dvd’s and of course the old ‘pick & mix’ sweet selection-now updated to ‘click & mix’.

The company have also relaunched the Ladybird brand of children’s clothing from age 0 to 8 year olds. Clothing, footwear and sports wear for older children will be introduced over the coming months.

Shop Direct expect the Woolworths online shop to make a profit in it’s first year of trading and are chasing trade from other online businesses such as Amazon.

Cheif Executive Mark Newton-Jones said the company are keen to become one of the half dozen websites that people go to regularly and added;

“We don’t have to create awareness about Woolworths because it’s a well known brand, which is a good starting point. We’re using different channels such as facebook, twitter, and blogs to promote the online store and we think that will generate interest in the new Woolworths.”

Now why didn’t the old Woolworths think of that?