Pricewatch Group, the family-owned and operated independent group of forecourts and convenience stores located across Sussex, is celebrating its second annual anniversary with leading food waste reduction app provider Gander.
Since launching the Gander app in its stores in the autumn of 2021, Pricewatch has hit a number of significant milestones on their second anniversary.
In the two years, the group has successfully marketed and sold 169,000 reductions through the Gander app with a staggering 120,000 user interactions already identified.
Claire Goddard, Marketing Manager at Pricewatch, says, “Investing in retail technology has had an extremely positive impact on our stores' shopper behaviour. Previously, our sell through rate was 57 per cent but since adopting Gander, our sell through rate has increased to 86 per cent, a huge increase of 51 per cent with no other changes made in store.
“As food prices have increased over the past two years, the Gander platform has really helped shoppers in our area manage their food bills. We’ve seen how some have had to change the way they shop and now save money by spending it on reduced food. This has helped us promote ourselves as a value retailer amongst our customers.”
Gander uses real time technology to highlight reduced to clear food items in stores near homes. It has the ability to reach thousands of people in the vicinity of a store, allowing shoppers to drop in and pick up a great price on selected products while enabling retailers to reduce their food waste at the same time.
“Gander provides us with real time information on reduced to clear food items, enabling our local shoppers save money on weekly food bills, whilst helping us reduce food waste,” she adds.
“As well as displaying reduced to clear food products in real time, Gander automatically removes sold items from the live feed of all in-store reductions. This is a huge benefit because it means our shoppers using the app are never disappointed when they reach our stores.
“We see our stores regularly selling over 86 per cent of our reduced food, which means the more people see the products available on Gander, the more they come in to store and buy them.
“We have made a commitment to reduce food waste and increase recycling within our business. Since working with Gander, we have seen how this has helped improve our margins while also supporting our local community.
“Reducing food waste also has a huge impact on the environment and its positive effect cannot be ignored. We have saved 177 tonnes of CO2 in two years - that's the equivalent of 177 hot air balloons across the sky - imagine the sight!
“The app has been brilliant, and I would urge any retailer looking to change their shoppers buying patterns to invest in it. It has really helped us reduce food waste and become a more sustainable business whilst allowing us to connect with our local customers from the comfort of their home,” says Goddard.
The Gander app integrated seamlessly with EDGEPoS, the EPOS system Pricewatch works with. The app’s real-time technology will allow Pricewatch to achieve significant cost savings while reducing stores food waste.
Stacey Williams, Head of Customer Engagement and Business Development at Gander, adds, “We are proud to partner with Pricewatch and we are delighted that our app technology is helping consumers in Sussex.
“As a leading forecourt and convenience store operation, it is exciting to see how well Pricewatch has adopted the technology. We look forward to working with Claire and the team well into the future so they can achieve their goals to reduce food waste and support local consumers to maximise their shopping budgets.”
Earlier in 2023 Gander enhanced its user experience by unveiling a series of new features. These include the ability for consumers to search by location rather than just specific stores, an optimised interface to improve useability and the ability to view additional store offers.
As many consumers continue to contend with rising costs, Gander aims to help families across the UK and Ireland to save money by providing real time information on yellow labelled food items in local convenience and forecourt stores.
Williams adds: “The new functionalities provide an enhanced user experience. The app’s new features allow consumers to faster locate yellow labelled foods, not only in store but right across their local area.
“Gander is committed to reducing food waste and to helping consumers to manage their shopping budget. Data from our Ganderlytics analytics platform, which is available to independent forecourt and convenience retailers, has shown that, on average, consumers using Gander save around 56 per cent on their food shop.
“The app recognises the potential to help households make the most of their shopping budget. Its live feed displays thousands of reduced products to consumers, allowing them to filter by dietary requirements and preference,” he concludes.
Since launching in 2019, Gander has partnered with 548 stores across the UK and Ireland in a bid to reduce food waste and transform bottom lines.
Integrating directly with retailers’ point of sale systems, the app provides an easy solution to reduce food waste by delivering real time information on reduced stock into the palm of the consumer’s hand.
InPost Newstrade, formerly Menzies Distribution, is making some changes to its carriage charge model following discussions with the Federation of Independent Retailers (the Fed).
In a letter to its UK customers which was being sent today (10), the news wholesaler has announced that it is to decrease the base charge to support retailers with lower sales.
For all other customers, the increase - which takes effect from April 5 - is being capped at £4.99 per store a week. In the Republic of Ireland, carriage charges are being frozen.
Commenting, the Fed’s National President Mo Razzaq said, “The Fed has been in discussion with InPost Newtrade about the difficulties our members are facing in such challenging financial times.
“The fact that the news wholesaler has listened – and more importantly – has acted on our members’ concerns is positive and we are pleased to see it taking steps to protect smaller news stores.
“That said, the Fed still does not support the carriage charge model, and we will continue to press for an alternative.
"We want our supply chain partners to get round the table to explore better ways of operating that mean publishers and wholesalers are not piling on more costs on hard-pressed retailers who can ill afford to pay them.”
In the letter to its customers, In Post Newstrade managing director Grant Jordan said, “Each year we review our Carriage Service Charge (CSC) template, which we use to recover a proportion of our costs.
"In 2025, we have taken the decision to decrease the base charge, actively supporting stores with lower sales within the category.
"We are also introducing a mechanism to make CSC more proportionate to category sales by adjusting the newspaper and magazine percentage sale contributions.
“We remain committed to working alongside our partners to support the long-term sustainability of the newspaper and magazine category, with service excellence and customer satisfaction always remaining our priority.”
This comes a few months after InPost acquired the remaining 70 per cent stake in Menzies Distribution Limited in an all-cash transaction valued at £60.4 million.
As reported in October last year, the third segment, MDS, responsible mainly for full load transport and warehousing was demerged from Menzies and is not part of the transaction. It will continue to be run by its existing management team and InPost will retain a 30 per cent shareholding.
The acquisition builds on the strong commercial growth that InPost has shown in the UK – tripling its revenue in the UK market over the last year – and will allow the business to fulfil several strategic objectives.
The retail industry is being “raided like a piggy bank”, chief executive of Marks & Spencer has stated, calling on the UK government to delay or ease planned tax and recycling charges.
Writing in the Sunday Times, Stuart Machin said that without pausing or staggering the changes to national insurance and business rates, which come into effect this April, UK retail would get smaller.
He also speculated on whether successive governments were guilty of a “snobbery” about retail.
Machin said a plan to lower the threshold at which employers’ national insurance contributions (NICs) kick in should be phased in over two years.
Machin has stated previously too that changes to NICs would add £60m to the company’s costs which equated to about half a total rise in wage costs for M&S, including an increase in the legal minimum wage.
He wrote, "The sector already pays an effective tax rate of 55 per cent and the chancellor’s budget will add £7 billion of extra employment costs and an increased packaging levy to a sector working on margins of 3-5 per cent.
"While businesses like M&S will fight tooth and nail to hold down prices for customers, the British Retail Consortium and Institute of Grocery Distribution are already projecting food inflation of more than 4 per cent."
Machin further warned that UK food manufacturing and farming would contract, domestic products would go up in price and more food would be imported with potentially less stringent quality and environmental standards.
The retail boss also attacked the upcoming Deposit Return Scheme, which is slated to go ahead in 2027, calling it "nonsensical".
Extended producer responsibility (EPR), born as an environmental levy to fund recycling, would give retailers "a tax bill 20 times the current amount with £2 billion going straight to the Treasury as general taxation and no improvement to recycling".
"Retail is being raided like a piggy bank and it’s unacceptable," he wrote.
Machin is calling on the government to delay the increase in EPR fees and, more broadly, pause and review all Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (Defra) circularity recycling schemes.
"They have been poorly planned and evidence to date shows that they are highly costly and nigh on impossible to operate," he pointed out.
" Rethink the approach to business rates. We need a proper review of business taxation facing retailers, not a tweak that redistributes funds within the sector.
"The £500,000 threshold hits high street stores, which I know the government did not foresee, so take those shops out of it.
"Ensure the Defra minister works with the sector, not against it. Co-create a food strategy focused on growing British food production, push on with a veterinary agreement to help smooth the impact of Brexit, and think again on inheritance tax.
"These would be the right decisions for the environment and welfare, too," he stated.
Pernod Ricard is exploring a sale of its champagne brand G.H. Mumm, Reuters reported citing five sources familiar with the matter, as the company looks to focus on premium labels in its portfolio.
The French spirits giant behind Absolut Vodka and Jameson Irish whiskey is working with investment bank Rothschild & Co on the possible divestiture, that could attract interest from other spirits and beverage companies, the sources said.
The brand, a top French champagne house, is unlikely to be sold for less than three times its annual sales of €200 million (£166m), one of the people said. The company has been selective in who it sells assets to and a sale may not happen, the person cautioned. The sources were speaking on condition of anonymity because the matter is not public.
“Pernod Ricard regularly assesses and evaluates its strategic opportunities and is continuously exploring options, including divestments or the streamlining" of businesses, the company said in a statement.
"This is a usual process in line with management’s mission of delivering value to shareholders, employees, clients and stakeholders." It added no decision about any particular action had been taken.
Rothschild declined to comment.
A sale of Mumm should it go ahead would be the latest shift towards a portfolio more focused on spirits. Last year, Pernod divested a large portfolio of wine brands. Pernod Ricard also owns the champagne brand Perrier-Jouet which is not part of the talks.
The drinks group cut its 2025 outlook on Thursday, citing challenging market conditions in the United States and China. It is now expecting a low single digit decline in organic net sales for the full 2025 year.
Its finance chief Helene de Tissot also said that tariffs imposed by China and the United States could deal an estimated £200m blow to Pernod Ricard's business annually.
China has already imposed temporary tariffs on European brandy imports, hurting Pernod's sales of its Martell cognac brand, in retaliation for punitive duties on China-made electric vehicles into the European Union.
The second-largest Western spirits maker faces the threat of US tariffs on Mexico, Canada and the European Union, which would affect products ranging from Irish and Canadian whiskies like Jameson to tequila and agave brands like Codigo 1530.
Pernod acquired G.H.Mumm in 2005. It was founded in 1827 in the Champagne region of the country and launched Mumm Napa in 1979 to make sparkling wines in California.
Mumm is known for its motto "Only the Best" and its Cordon Rouge red ribbon label.
French champagne shipments fell by nearly 10 per cent last year as economic and political uncertainties hit consumers' appetite for the sparkling wine in key markets such as France and the United States, the producers association said.
"Potentially dangerous" meat could appear on UK store shelves if the government does not adequately fund food security checks at Dover port, the Conservatives have warned.
Criticising the government in a heated back-and-forth in the Commons, shadow environment secretary Victoria Atkins accused that the government of spending “more than the entire Defra budget to surrender the Chagos Islands”.
Atkins hit out at the Government for “taxing British farming families for dying, slashing winter fuel payments for rural pensioners, and hiking taxes on rural businesses”.
“The head of port health at Dover warned the select committee this week that if funding is not secured within seven weeks, then food security checks at the border will be stopped.
“This will mean unchecked and potentially dangerous meat appearing on supermarket shelves and in restaurants, at a time when foot-and-mouth disease is in Germany. When will the Secretary of State protect out borders and confirm this funding?”
Responding to her queries, environment secretary Steve Reed said, “The NFU and other interested parties have quite rightly raised their concerns about the situation with foot and mouth that was discovered in Germany.
“We are relieved that there has not been a further spread of that outbreak, but we are taking all appropriate measures at the border to ensure that this country remains safe in terms of biosecurity, and we will continue to monitor the situation and take appropriate action, to ensure there can be no repeat of what happened around 20 years ago when foot-and-mouth outbreak in this country devastated farming and cost the economy a total of £14 billion.”
Atkins further asked Reed to clarify when will he confirm this funding.
She said, "Compare this relaxed approach with the Prime Minister’s seeming desperation to pay more than the entire Defra budget to surrender the Chagos Islands.
“Now, does (Mr Reed) really support taxing British farming families for dying, slashing winter fuel payments for rural pensioners, and hiking taxes on rural businesses to pay £9 billion to a foreign government on some dodgy legal advice from Labour lawyers?”
Environment minister Daniel Zeichner meanwhile told MPs the Government is aware of challenges at Dover.
Zeichner said, “The issues at Dover are significant, they’ve been long running. The funding was not resolved ahead of the general election, it is an ongoing discussion.
“We are very aware of the challenges that are faced, we are on it, and we will make sure that we are talking to the Dover Port Health Authority.”
Almost 10,000 counterfeit and smuggled cigarettes and other tobacco and nicotine-based products have been seized following a series of visits to retail premises by Oxfordshire County Council’s trading standards team.
As reported by the council, the raids, carried out on Jan 21, were part of Operation CeCe, a national initiative to tackle the sale and supply of illegal tobacco products.
Officers were accompanied by specialist tobacco detection dogs, which can sniff out contraband in concealments within till points or hidden in storerooms.
Premises involved included off-licences, convenience stores, food retailers and barbers in Banbury, Kidlington and Oxford, the council stated.
The operation resulted in the seizure of 9,340 illegal cigarettes, 700g of counterfeit hand rolling tobacco, 180 unit packs of non-compliant nicotine pouches and 42 disposable electronic cigarettes, or vapes, with a capacity of nicotine containing liquid nine times the maximum allowed.
The total street value of the haul was approximately £5,000.
Councillor Dr Nathan Ley, Oxfordshire County Council’s Cabinet Member for Public Health, Inequalities and Community Safety: “Our trading standards team, working in partnership with other agencies, will continue to crack down on the sale of these illegal products and cause the maximum disruption possible to criminal networks.
“People can help us to stamp out illegal tobacco and create a healthier and safer county by being vigilant and reporting any suspicious activity using the illegal tobacco hotline.”
Other issues detected were:
Two premises in breach of their licensing conditions.
One premises with a concealment operated by electromagnets, although no illegal product was contained within it.
Four premises with tobacco products on open display, whereas they must be out of sight of customers.
Two premises with evidence of staff sleeping or living in storerooms, which was referred to other agencies.
Investigations are ongoing, with premises facing potential criminal prosecution, licence reviews and additional sanctions, including financial penalties.
Elsewhere in Clifton, City of York Council and police officers visited a business last week, where nearly £5,000 of noncompliant vapes and illicit tobacco was found and seized.
The illegal items found and taken have an estimated retail value of £4,941.25, including 177 noncompliant vapes with a retail value of £2,124, 2,250 counterfeit and illicit cigarettes valued at £731 an d1,450g of counterfeit and illicit hand rolling tobacco valued at £2,086.
Cllr Jenny Kent, Executive Member with portfolio for Trading Standards at City of York Council, said, "Tobacco kills hundreds of people in York every year, and the illicit market in tobacco and vapes makes harmful products cheaper and more easily available, especially to those below the legal age limit.
“Illicit vapes are becoming much more prevalent and are partly responsible for the rise in young people vaping – our public health advice is that while we support e-cigarettes as effective quit aids for adults to stop smoking, people who don’t smoke shouldn’t vape."
“This is why it is so important that you report concerns. Information from members of the public, investigation, and action by Council and police officers is essential to protect public health and enforce proper regulations.”