Next week Gareth Ackerman steps down as chair of the Pick n Pay board, with the founding family now still holding a substantial 49% of the shares. Any regrets? “I think one of the fingers that could probably be pointed at me was that maybe I was too supportive over the years with not enough questioning, and the board not questioning decisions enough,” says Chairman Ackerman the Younger. He also notes that “local is often best” in the appointment of senior management – a dig perhaps at Pieter Boone, who attempted to implement the Ekuseni strategy of splitting the legacy brand in two – Pick n Pay, and QualiSave for the mid-to-lower end of the market. Although he has nothing but kind words for Richard Brasher, who came to the business from the UK and for Sean Summers, who originally left the business after a dust-up about the need for centralised distribution – he was pro, the Ackermen were anti. Let bygones be bygones: “We’re on a multi-year transformational journey, but there’s a plan that has been put forward, and it has been shared with the market, and we’re on plan, and it’s actually working well,” says Ackerman.

Comment: Time for the KAMs among our readers to dust off the playbook from the Summers years.

That Woolies dark store in Cape Town’s City Bowl we mentioned not so long ago – a big hit, apparently. “The dark store drives improved productivity and efficiency, as the space and format is geared to online picking and our online team can scale to increased demand more easily,” says a (suitably anonymous) Woolies spokesperson. “We can put more order volumes through a store where we don’t compete with in-store shoppers for either aisle space or product availability.” And according to Woolies online and mobile director Liz Hilock, “Investing in dark stores is testament to our focus on creating a future-fit omnichannel offering, that leverages and transforms existing assets to continuously improve our customer’s experience […] Woolies Dash complements our already expansive online service, from our scheduled delivery service with a broad regional footprint to our drive-through click-and-collect service.” Woolies Dash grew +71% in the last FY – it will be interesting to see what effect dark stores have if more are rolled out. And here’s a fun fact we can keep in mind: Shoprite alone has created somewhere north of 11,000 jobs in the food delivery sector since the launch of Sixty60.

Comment: How are suppliers optimising their own production and supply chains to serve these burgeoning delivery services?

Woolies has announced the addition of a newly dedicated baby and kids’ department in its South Gate Mall store, embracing the full range from kid’s fashion to toiletries, food, toys, nursery essentials and mum-to-be necessities. Is the next step a standalone? Perhaps too soon to tell. Next, extending its in-store ‘mall within a store’ concept even further is Checkers, with the opening of its first in-store Susu Bubble Tea branches in Checkers Helderberg and Checkers Hyper Sandton. This will be a big hit with the increasingly commercially appealing Gen-Z crew and joins other successful in-store collabs by Checkers with brands like Starbucks, Krispy Kreme and Kauai. Behind the scenes, next, with Massmart, which has introduced Walmart’s generative AI-powered My Assistant app, designed to help employees streamline daily tasks like generating first drafts for emails, marketing content, and performance goals, allowing them to spend more time on strategic work.

Comment: AI is often lauded for its potential to freeing up workers to exercise greater creativity. Are we actually training and empowering our workforces to think more strategically as this largely untested tech comes onstream?

A grab-bag of news this week from our favourite US supermarket, Trader Joe’s. For the uninitiated, Trader Joe’s is a vaguely tropical-themed super that stocks almost entirely dealer-own brands, keeping things fresh through a range of exotic and creative ready-to-eat meals, drinks, and snacks, some of which achieve cult status and sell out as soon as they hit the shelves. This northern hemisphere autumn, a couple of the standouts are their Pumpkin Cranberry Crisps, their Savory Squash Pastry Bites, and (ahem) their Pumpkin Spice Rooibos. One of the things it’s been selling out lately is a Trader Joe’s branded mini-tote – an iconic item which retails for $2.99 but has fetched up to $280 on eBay. In less happy news, meat producer BrucePac is recalling nearly 10 million pounds of meat and poultry products sold at Trader Joe’s, Target, Kroger and other retailers because they might be contaminated with listeria – an issue, which it turns out is not uniquely South African.

Comment: Back to Trader Joe’s, we know, in our heart of hearts, that any South African retailer pursuing this particular brand of shoppertainment, with a local spin, would be rewarded with deep and lasting success.

A couple of items of interest from Unilever this week. First up, the global consumer products giant has at last concluded its exit from Russia, with the sale of its local assets, valued at around 40 billion rubles ($410m) to Arnest Group, a manufacturer of perfume, cosmetics, and household products. The move marks the conclusion of one year at the helm for CEO Hein Schumacher who has overseen plans to spin off the ice cream business, lay off up to 7,500 staff, and focus on 30 key brands after some years of underperformance. Moving on, Unilever has brought gorgeous Xhosa style to Paris Fashion Week in a collab between TRESemmé and South African design house MaXhosa Africa. “Through our collaboration with MaXhosa Africa, we’re honouring diverse hair textures and showing how they perfectly complement the bold creativity of African fashion, and we are proud to be doing this on a global stage,” says TRESemmé Brand Lead Xola Alakhe Mbadamana.

Comment: Two bold moves from a business that has never been afraid to innovate. Manufacturers wishing to make a splash in the world could do worse than pairing up with some of our prodigious local talent.

About 20 million South Africans, or 63% of households, are food insecure, with about 17% of households having to cut back on meal size or the number of meals consumed, and often running out of food. Another 26% of households are moderately food insecure, frequently consuming low-quality, undesirable food and occasionally reducing the size or number of meals. This according to our new Minister of Agriculture John Steenhuisen, quoting an HSRC survey of all nine provinces from 2021 to 2023, and pointing to the GNU’s evidence-based approach to policymaking. “Budgets and interventions can now be implemented in a focused manner to deal with this problem,” says Farmer John, adding that a whole-of-society approach is necessary to fully solve the problem. Among these interventions will be an attempt to address food waste: South Africa produces about 31 million tons of food every year but about a third of it is wasted, the majority of which occurs before retail. Consultants PwC suggest that food companies improve traceability information to establish the effectiveness of supply chains and reduce this waste.

Comment: A whole-of-society approach necessarily involves all of us – particularly suppliers and retailers, who are uniquely positioned to lend their resources and expertise to a national effort to end hunger.