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Remember that story about the Gillitts man who was set upon by rogues in his driveway and left for dead halfway down Kloof Gorge? In our rat-eyed, sceptical Durban way we thought there was something funny about that and of course we were right. It turns out that Mr Bruce Galloway is the target of a strongly-worded letter penned by the lawyers of three businessmen who allege that he bled their business dry in his capacity as minority shareholder and imparter of wisdom in a BEE scheme he had sold to both them and SPAR. This is how it was meant to work: SPAR would provide finance for black businessmen to open branches in partnership with Galloway, who took responsibility for repaying SPAR over five years. Problem was, Galloway was allegedly siphoning off spurious but substantial amounts of cash to pay off unspecified loans pertaining to the operations of these branches, but not showing his partners the supporting financials. The businessmen in question are now going after both Galloway and SPAR for restitution – the later because they believe that there should have been better oversight.

Comment: Oh dear, oh dear, Bruce. What have we got ourselves all tangled up in?

Anyone here an expert on the workings of the Lusaka stock exchange? Thought not. Right then, we’ll have to do this ourselves: Shoprite is attempting to reverse the sale of shares in certain transactions undertaken by its transfer secretary in Zambia, while the shareholders concerned, including the Luxembourgeois outfit Blackstar Group SE, are fighting this reversal, arguing that the shares they bought were legit. Shoprite is also withholding the payment of dividend to Zambian investors pending the outcome of the action in the Zambian High Court, The Blackstar Group, in their own words are “an investment company, whose objective is to gain exposure to the growth on the African continent largely through companies in South Africa with the underlying themes of strategic market position and strong cash flow.” Which sounds a bit like Shoprite to us.

Comment: Sort it out, you lot. Or at least tell us what’s going on.

In one of those hearty displays of muscular nationalism in which Americans like to indulge occasionally, every afternoon, twice in the morning and before they go to bed at night; Walmart has promised that it will be bringing $50billion worth of manufacturing back home where it belongs, over the next ten years. That’s a lot of dollars, we hear you gasp. Well, yes. Although they do shift $466billion in cut-price merchandise every year, so the move does have a certain symbolic element. On the other hand, the US operation currently sources two thirds of its groceries from the US, so there is already not much to complain about there. And part of what’s made this initiative possible is the changing cost of global sourcing, with stuff you could get by the shipload from China for next to nothing costing almost as much as the stuff you could make back home, what with tariffs, duties and the growing expectations of the average Chinese worker.

Comment: Brouhaha! Sorry? No, just something caught in our throat.

Those Astrapak interims about which you have been so anxiously enquiring – well fret no more. Or do. But here they are, anyway: Revenue up just 1.2% to R1.2billion‚ on a 5.4% volume decline and a 6.6% average selling price increase. Not what you were hoping to hear. And profit from continuing operations before interest‚ tax‚ depreciation and amortisation down 25.2% to R95.3million, with margin sliding to 3.6% compared with 5.9% this time last year. But before you start loosening you tie and readying yourself for a final desperate leap from the grim and gargoyled East Tower of the Johannesburg Securities Exchange, bear in mind that Astrapak are just one year into a two-year recovery programme and that what with an exceptional loss of R35million relating to “insurance and impairments”, as well as tricky trading conditions, they’re actually ahead of target.

Comment: Go forth, celestial voyager! We’re rooting for you.

If you’re shuffling of to the office with the same battered briefcase and your lunch in the same blue Tupperware you’ve been using since 1998, you may wish to shoot Unilever a line to see if there are any openings. Le Grand Bleu, you see, has been has been certified as South Africa’s Top Employer for 2014 by the Top Employers Institute, measured on a number of scales which include Primary Benefits, Secondary Benefits and Working Conditions, Training and Development, Career Development and Culture Management. Hot on Unilever’s heels, from this great sector we call home, was Nestlé in number two, with PenBev coming in tenth, and no look in from any of our retailers at all. Increasingly, this recognition has become more than a nice to have, with the Employer Value Proposition (EVP) an essential component in attracting SA’s apparently diminishing talent.

Comment: Talent is perhaps the wrong word here. We have enormous reserves of talent, but diminishing opportunities for it to be realised through education.

A great business which has rather dropped off these pages in recent years is Grindrod, which comes storming back in this week with the acquisition for R228million of 20% of NWK, a Lichtenburg-based agricultural co-operative, and the purchase for almost twice that of 20% of Senwes. What’s that all about you ask. It’s like this: Grindrod now sit on the board of two of SA’s biggest agricultural Co-ops, helping the Big G diversify its portfolio out of transport and logistics, while potentially growing the market for its services in these areas, particularly as it moves into Africa. So an agricultural operation in which Senwes is invested in Mozambique, for example, just saying, will need someone to haul its produce down to the docks in Beira, and this would in all likelihood be Grindrod.

Comment: Exciting stuff. And here, we quietly predict a modest boom for the South African economy if enough of our big boys and of course girls start thinking like this.

Consumer Confidence, you will be alarmed to learn, is at a ten year low, hitting -8 on the FNB/Bureau of Economic Research Scale in the third quarter, compared with the relatively buoyant -4 it to which it sank in the depths of the financial crisis of 2008. Consumers were quizzed by the BER about the expected performance of the economy, their anticipated financial position and how they rated the appropriateness of the present time to buy durable goods such as furniture, appliances and electronic equipment. On the back of strikes in the manufacturing, auto and fuel and retail sectors, work stoppages on mines which have also nipped 0.3% off economic growth for the month of June according to no less a personage than our President and unemployment up to 25.6% and record fuel prices hitting everyone, they were understandably muted in their response.

Comment: Things are frankly not looking up for increased activity at the tills, which bodes ill for economic growth in an economy where consumer spending accounts for 66c in every ront. Pass the martini.

Big news is brewing as our friends Imperial Logistics and Barloworld Logistics host a knees-up with Transnet Freight Rail next week for the signing of an MoU aimed at “exploring multimodal collaboration opportunities within the logistics and transport sector.” The companies aim to leverage road and rail logistics capabilities and address other factors such as road congestion, road accidents, greenhouse gas emissions and to lower the cost of doing business for customers. We’ll keep you posted.

Kudos this week to Pick n Pay, which scored gold in the Eco-Logic Awards for the gains their energy efficiency initiatives have made in operational and behavioural changes to achieve an 8.7% improvement in energy usage last year, and for Imperial Logistics who netted a gold and three silver medals at the Logistics Achiever Awards for improving customer competitiveness. Also to Woolies for the tenth anniversary of their smaakvolle Taste mag.