One of the rays of light in the dark night of the soul Pick n Pay has been experiencing over the past few years has been its Smart Shopper loyalty programme, which is now six million members strong and rising, outstripping the Clicks ClubCard programme, granddaddy of loyalty in the republic, by two million. Now they’re taking it to the next level offering a Smart Shopper app which will enable punters to manage their points on their mobile device rather than at in-store kiosks, switching and redeeming points at the till, checking their points balance, and finding out what vouchers are available to them. Smart Shopper has been acknowledged by some analysts as SA’s biggest loyalty programme, and even rival Shoprite previously dismissive of such endeavours, has come on board even if obliquely by hooking up with eBucks.

Comment: Visionary stuff, determined execution. That’s how you do it.

In difficult times, it seems CEOs take comfort in punditry when they scratch out their intro to the annual report. Last week we had Simon Susman laying it at the door of government and the unions. This week it’s Mr James W Basson taking on the manufacturing sector for its “lack of innovation and competitiveness.” Manufacturers, he suggests, are going cap in hand to the government for protection against cheap imports against which they cannot compete, rather than striving to be more globally competitive. And with the manufacturing sector in decline, he avers, so too is the customer base for retailers like Shoprite. Indeed, some analysts have pointed to the disinclination of manufacturers to invest in  capacity which would make them more competitive, opting instead to blow it all on dividends and directors salaries.

Comment: Practices which, in fairness, retailers have also been known to indulge.

A slice of life for you from Zimbabwe, where 51 workers that OK Zimbabwe inherited from Makro are giving their new bosses a hard time for what they consider harsh working conditions. And things have devolved into a bit of a war of words between the retailers in question. But let’s backtrack a little: you may recall that Massmart exited Zim in March 2011 under the government’s frankly loony indigenisation policy, which required 51% Zimbabwean ownership of any foreign business. Massmart sold their only Makro in Zim to OK Zim, which rebranded it OK Mart. The workers in question complain inter alia, that since the takeover they no longer have access to free transport, they have to pay more at the company canteen, and they are required to work overtime. Management allege that the only thing they have to complain about is that they don’t get to steal from the business any more. Which they had to do because Makro was broke. Makro reply that their exit from Zim was orderly, planned, and not in any way brought about by bankruptcy.

Comment: Nasty stuff. One wonders why one bothers sometimes.

Word from Namibia, where an unnamed local consortium of government-backed biscuit bakers are battling to get their product on the shelves of local Pick n Pays, Checkers/Shoprites and Games. The products are made from millet, locally known as mahangu, and are made in Rehoboth by a group of entrepreneurs under an initiative of the product development division of the Ministry of Agriculture, Water and Forestry. According to the retailers, permission needs to be given from Head Office back home before the teatime treats can hit the shelves. The biccies, packaged variously as Oatmeal Cookies, Cookies, Biscuits and Cookies with Nuts are apparently selling like, erm, hot cakes at other less bureaucratic chains such as Woermann & Brock, Tre-Supermarket, Spar and Food Lovers Market.

Comment: Every ministry should have a product development division. Except of course for the Ministry of War.

Here are the results from the Poultry Industry, aggregated for your convenience into one handy report: Moan, complain, Brazil, EU, whine, Import Tariffs, whinge, Input Prices. Last week, you will have read, the government hiked import tariffs on several imported chicken products by 8.75 percentage points on average, and tariffs on whole birds to 82%, to protect the local industry. This according to Sovereign Foods goes only some of the way, as it applies only to non-EU countries, the origin, apparently, of most of the chicken legs which make their way to these shores. Reporting their interims last week, Sovereign informed us that profit before tax declined by 5.8% to R20.2million for the six months to August, with competition from imports a big culprit but input prices doing their bit – feed costs have gone up 22% for the period while volumes are 4% down on last year.

Comment: The poultry industry does indeed have much to fret about. Although Whitey Basson (see Shoprite, above) takes a different view.

Don’t hold your breath waiting for a rand recovery. Well, do, if you like that sort of thing, because the dear old ZAR is apparently set for a short rally between now and the end of the year, before plunging off the high diving board and into the deep end come Jan. This according to Danske Bank A/S, who, we are told, have made something of a career out of predicting the vagaries, peccadilloes and meanderings of our currency reckon that it’ll pick up 3% to R9.67 to the dollar by the end of this year, then slide 6.2% in the next three quarters. The Danske Bank believes that the recovery, such that it is, will not last because of the power of the unions at the moment and the government’s inimical stance on investment.

Comment: The link between governance and our economic prosperity has perhaps never been more evident. Time for everyone to vote with their dwindling wallets.

Bit of a revolving door over at Unilever, where they like to keep CEOs – or senior VPs as they like to call them - on their toes by redeploying them with unseemly haste. This time, it’s van Tiggelen out, Cowan in. Marijn van Tiggelen is heading to China to take up the role of Executive Vice-President of Unilever North Asia, while Peter Cowan, whom Unilever acquired fairly recently when they bought Alberto Culver. He had previously spent time at Johnson&Johnson, and get this, the New Zeelind Deery Board.

This is the sort of stuff we get off SENS so you don’t have to: “The board of Woolworths Holdings (“board”) wishes to advise that Lindiwe Bakoro will retire as Non-Executive Director from the board at the conclusion of the annual general meeting of the Company to be held on 26 November 2013. She will be taking up a significant executive role in industry and we wish her much success. During her four year tenure on the board Lindiwe was a member of the audit, risk and remuneration committees. The board wishes to thank Lindiwe for the significant contribution she has continuously made to our board and our business.” Yes well, congrats and all that but hardly the shot in the arm for empowerment the industry was looking for, is it?