Rajah rages over 'rip-off'

[Gabisile Ndebele] Couturier to the stars Gavin Rajah claims he has fallen victim to the man accused of a scam that exploited the name of international model Tyra Banks. Read more >>

Tradehold sees unchanged earnings

Retail group Tradehold Limited advised that it expects to report a headline loss per share of 0.8 pence for the year ended 28 February 2009. Read more >>

Ackerman earns honorary doctorate

Chairman of retail giant Pick n Pay, Raymond Ackerman, received an honorary doctorate from the University of KwaZulu-Natal today, 24 April 2009. Ackerman was awarded a Doctor of Commerce degree in recognition of the role that he has played in shaping the retail and economic landscape of South Africa. Read more >>

Used-car sales outperform new car sales

[Artwell Dlamini] Consumers are still looking for bargains at both used-car showrooms and auction houses, taking full advantage of the declining prices. Read more >>

Extending Stellenbosch wine fest fun with 'Wine Week'

[ActivRetail] As if showcasing more than 500 wines under one roof is not enough, this year the Stellenbosch Wine Festival literally goes the extra mile to extend its Winelands hospitality even further with its ‘Wine Week', attracting fun-loving visitors to South Africa's oldest and foremost wine route between 24 - 31 July 2009. Read more >>

South African wine sales fall

South African wine sales have followed UK sales sharply lower, Tai Collard, MD of direct wine marketer, Wine of the Month Club said today, 21 April 2009. Read more >>

Economists predict repo rate cut

[Neo Semono] Economists predict the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) will announce a 100 basis point cut in the repo rate on Thursday, 30 April 2009, after their two-day meeting. Read more >>

Fore Good appoints new CEO, CFO

The Fore Good Investment Group has appointed Leron Varsha as chief executive officer and Wayne Sacharowitz as chief financial officer. Read more >>

Darsot wins international star status

South African manufacturer of canned goods, cooking oil and detergents, Darsot Food Corporation, has received the International Star for Leadership in Quality Award for consistently producing premier quality food products. Read more >>

Nestlé posts 2.1% sales drop in first quarter

GENEVA: Swiss food giant Nestlé on Wednesday, 23 April 2009, said first quarter sales fell 2.1% to 25,2 billion Swiss francs (€16,7 billion, US$21,6 billion), hit by negative currency exchange rates. Read more >>

Sony Ericsson to cut 2,000 jobs after losses

STOCKHOLM: Mobile phone maker Sony Ericsson last week said it would cut 2,000 more jobs after it reported a loss of €293 million ($384 million) in the first quarter, as analysts said the company needed a strategy re-think. Read more >>

Savanna claims online campaign success

Distell's Savanna cider's latest campaign via the interactive website www.inthelemonlight.co.za and supported by digital channels has proved highly successful, the company says. Read more >>

Cotlands gets giant helping hand

[ActivRetail] FMCG giant Foodcorp recently donated R50,000 to Cotlands, a non-profit organisation, which supports South African children living with or affected by HIV/AIDS. Read more >>

Fore Good gets Braun, Pringles

FMCG group Fore Good is the new brand custodian and distributor for Pringles and Braun in southern Africa, having concluded an agreement with Procter & Gamble (P&G) Geneva International. Read more >>

Nokia Music Store opens in SA

The virtual South African Nokia Music Store, music.nokia.co.za, offering hundreds of thousands of local and international tracks, finally opened for business on Friday, 24 April 2009. Read more >>

Amazon net profit up, Kindle sales praised

NEW YORK: US online retail giant Amazon announced a 24% increase in quarterly net profit on Thursday, 23 April 2009, and said sales of its electronic book reader, the Kindle, had exceeded expectations. Read more >>

Paymo: Harnessing a global mobile payments market

[Jack M. Germain] It's far more common for consumers to have cellphones than credit cards, particularly outside the United States. Therefore, a unified system to use phones to make payments seems to be a no-brainer. The difficulty has been in the execution of this rather simple concept. However, Paymo believes it has found a way. Read more >>

Meeting the cost-effectiveness test with e-commerce innovation

[Jesse Goldman] Unlocking the potential of your online business may require nothing more than a little introspection. A closer look at the things that make your online business work could reveal quick, cost-effective ways to improve customer acquisition and retention. Read more >>

Massive marketing platform for Joburg's wine show

This year exhibitors at The Wine Show Jo'burg can benefit from an aggressive marketing campaign created by the organisers of the event. A substantial investment has been made to target an audience of approximately five million Gauteng consumers during the run-up to the show. Read more >>

Dettol recalls 750ml batch

Reckitt Benckiser is recalling around 25,000 bottles of Dettol, as a product batch has been found to be contaminated with the toxic chemicals acetone and butoxyethanol, the Daily News reports. The 750ml bottles have the batch numbers 55726, 55730, 55732 and 55734 with an expiry date of 02/2011. Spokesperson Eunice Mogotloane says that although the products "shouldn't have any adverse health effects", any consumers experiencing irritation to skin, eyes or nose should seek medical attention. Consumers in possession of the affected products can call the Reckitt Benckiser care line at 086 111 1100. Read the full report on IOL.

SA restaurants among top 40

[Werner Swart] Five South African restaurants are among the top 100 in the world. Read more >>

The facts and fictions of online shipping costs

[Denise J. Deveau] For some online shoppers, e-commerce bargains turn very sour the minute they get to the checkout page and find out what their shipping costs are going to be. Is "express shipping" just a ploy to pad the site's bottom line, especially since standard shipments sometimes arrive just as fast? Are sellers making a killing by jacking up transport prices? E-tailers say it's quite the opposite. Read more >>

On pins and needles

[Claire Bisseker] One billion rand of the clothing industry's contribution to GDP was wiped out last year and more than 10,000 jobs were lost — about 10% of the industry's workforce. And that was when SA was still on the periphery of the global economic crisis and before it had entered a recession. Read more >>

SA manufacturing to face pressure

Fitch Ratings says in a special report published Thursday, 23 April 2009, that the global economic downturn is having an increasingly negative impact on the demand for manufactured goods from South Africa. Read more >>

Dyeing breed

[Sasha Planting] Rex Trueform, Seardel and indirectly, Brimstone are the only remaining listed clothing manufacturers on the JSE, and they are hanging by a thread. In six years the clothing industry has shed 39,000 jobs as the companies have failed to grow their market to grow their market caps significantly. Read more >>

ANC unstitches South Africa's clothing industry

[Renato Palmi] All the rhetoric about how important South Africa's clothing and textile industry is for poverty alleviation and the years spent around policy development for this industry sector has been unbundled by the revelation that ANC election T-shirts were made in China. Read more >>

Mpahlwa launches furniture centre

[Michael Hamlyn] A R20 million furniture "incubation" centre was launched at the weekend in Mthatha by Mandisi Mpahlwa, the Minister of Trade and Industry. Read more >>

FIFA clothing to hit stores

The global launch of the official clothing range of FIFA-branded products and merchandise will happen later this year, prior to the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa. Read more >>

Nampak earnings down 35-45%

Packaging company Nampak advised on Friday that its headline earnings per share and basic earnings per share are expected to be between 35% and 45% lower than the 109.9 and 110.4 cents per share respectively for the six months ended 31 March 2009 from the year earlier period. Read more >>

Packaging should tell a different story

Players in the packaging industry have a number of critical roles to play in today's consumer environment. Adam Botha, creative director of the Switch Group brand consultancy, says that both designers and packaging producers can make a vital contribution in changing clients' and consumers' mindset and encouraging the responsible development and disposal of packaging. Read more >>

Working together on going green

A tripartite alliance between retailers, consumers and packaging manufacturers has a role to play in developing environmentally friendly packaging. Read more >>

In terminal decline?

[Matebello Motloung] The liquor and advertising industries are bracing themselves for next month, when government is expected to say whether it will forge ahead with plans to ban alcohol advertising. Read more >>

EU backs Dior in trademark row

LUXEMBOURG: Placing luxury goods such as Christian Dior products in discount stores can affect their quality, a European court ruled on Thursday, backing the French fashion house in a copyright case. Read more >>

FIFA scores court win against Pretoria sports bar

[Sanchia Temkin] International soccer body FIFA secured its first 2010 court victory in the Pretoria High Court yesterday against a Pretoria sports bar for ambush marketing. Read more >>

Shebeen poser for SAB

[Adele Shevel] An impasse over regulations granting liquor licences in the Western Cape is hampering SAB's beer sales in South Africa. Read more >>

Launch of new custom lifestyle magazine

The Publishing Partnership (TPP) is now publishing a new custom magazine for the RCS group, called RCS Lifestyle, with creative partner Tenfour Media. The new title aims to introduce positive influences into its readers' lives, intending to improve and harness their lifestyles, while positively reinforcing the benefits of RCS. Read more >>

Woolies winter campaign boosts 2010 confidence

With about 15 months to go until the start of the 2010 FIFA World Cup, Woolworths has designed a marketing campaign for winter 2009 aimed at reminding South Africans of all the reasons there are to believe in ourselves and to remember what we can accomplish when we put our minds to it. Read more >>

Augmented reality campaign brings books to life

Creative agency Saatchi & Saatchi Cape Town introduced the application of augmented reality (AR), as part of an experiential activation in selected malls, for literature retail outlet Wordsworth Books last week. Anton Crone, executive creative director of Saatchi & Saatchi Cape Town, says the campaign marks the debut of AR in consumer marketing in South Africa, and the African continent. Read more >>

Nando's ‘Julius' ad ruffles ANCYL feathers

The African National Congress Youth League is anything but amused; it has demanded that Nando's and its advertising agency withdraw the retailer's latest TV ad in which a puppet that seems to resemble the Youth League's leader, Julius Malema, explains how you can get more change at Nando's. In a statement issued today, Tuesday, 21 April 2009, the league says, “Whatever is the lousy explanation of the Nandos [sic] advertisement, the ANC YL is fully aware that the advertisement is intended at mocking the President of the ANC YL, and in a racist fashion portrays political leaders as Cartoons [sic].” The statement goes further to threaten ‘militant' action. For more comment: Twitter Search and Google News.

Tracking the trackers

[Denis Pombriant] It used to be that a company interested in what the media were saying about it employed a clipping service and waited a few weeks. Now, with services like Blogpulse, Keotag and Marketing Pilgrim, that info is available instantly. Remember, though, that it's not just available to you, but to your competitors as well. Read more >>

Pick n Pay opens more stores in Soweto

South African retailer Pick n Pay has opened its fifth and sixth Pick n Pay stores in Soweto, underscoring the group's growing market share in the area. Read more >>

Confident Clicks geared for expansion

[Adele Shevel] Clicks is accelerating the roll-out of new pharmacies as many other businesses slash expansion plans. Read more >>

Pick n Pay posts higher earnings

Retailer Pick n Pay on Thursday, 23 April 2009, reported an 18.1% rise in diluted headline earnings per share to 230.62 cents for the year ended February 2009 from 195.28 cents a year ago. Read more >>

German retailer Arcandor needs €900m

BERLIN: Troubled German retail group Arcandor said on Monday, 20 April 2009, it needs new loans of up to €900 million (US$1.2 billion) from banks and the state in order to survive the recession. Read more >>

Steel price spike hurts food suppliers

[Nicola Mawson] Food retailer Pick n Pay said Thursday, 23 April 2009, it would back any of its suppliers who wanted to lodge a complaint with the competition authorities over the recent steep hike in steel prices. Read more >>

Acer launches mobile phones in Asia

SINGAPORE: Taiwan-based computer giant Acer on Wednesday, 22 April 2009, launched a series of advanced mobile phones for the Asia-Pacific region, ramping up its expansion into the wireless communication market. Read more >>

Lunch Bar? Oviaas! - Cadbury South Africa

Much like the “Crutches” commercial which was launched last year, Cadbury's quirky new commercial for Lunch Bar, entitled "Bear", focusses on the unexpected talents of people that eat Lunch Bar and uses the tag line, "Much, Much More!". Read more >>