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So Choppies has been on something of a tear these how many years now, taking on SPAR at home in Botswana, putting up DCs and stores in SA and generally keeping the punters happy. But now a shadow falls on that smooth and sunny upward curve of growth. On the surface of it, the Choppies results were pretty decent: turnover was up 24% to 7.4billion pula, with profit climbing 12% to 1.44billion pula. At issue is the way ahead: with the Botswanan economy slowing to growth of 3.5% against a projected 4.2%, things are not that rosy at home. And while Choppies still owns 30% of the market there, rival Shoprite is way more profitable. And SA hasn’t been a bed of roses either, with the plucky cross-border raider battling to make it out of its scattered enclaves in the mining towns of the North West, and sales there declining for three years in a row.

Comment: All of which has caused the analysts to become restive, and ask questions like “whither?” and more importantly “how much?”

Gone are the days, it seems, and not too soon, when a single retailer, with a suitcase full of cash, would sidle up to a mall owner and next thing you know the anchor deal was mouldering safely in the chairman’s Chubb wall safe. Nowadays, with retail property at such a premium, malls will happily let three or four out of the big six duke it out in the marbled halls, scrapping over punters like a bunch of hyena pups over a wildebeest skull. So it is in the new Central Square Mall at Menlyn Maine, where are to be found a next-generation Pick n Pay complete with biltong bar and sushi stand, a spanking new SPAR with green tech that cuts consumption by 67%, and a Woolies Food with a full-service café. The mall itself is as green as all get-out, with the only 4 Green Star (or higher) rating in the industry from the Green Building Council of South Africa, who don’t dish these things out lightly.

Comment: This is fantastic. Here we are, in a developing country, in the midst of an economic malaise for which there doesn’t seem to be any name yet, and our visionary businesses are investing in projects which do right by the planet and benefit the old bottom line at the same time.

Look we’re not really supposed to do this, but everyone’s taking a bit of a breather after results season, so let’s indulge in a little DIY. Of the variety offered by Massmart, naturally, which took a little flutter on home improvement back in the year 3, and now finds itself in possession of a market-leading, R12billion, 102-store behemoth known as Builders. Builders, you will recall, trades in four formats: Builders Warehouse (‘big-box’), Express (convenience), Superstore (lower-end) and Trade Depot (contractors and tradesmen). It has grown at 11% in every year but the annus horribilis that was 2009, when it shrank by 1%. The business now trades beyond our borders, in Botswana, Mozambique and Zambia, which contribute a growing share of the haul. While growth has flattened in recent years, the chain hopes to add another 13 stores by the end of 2017, edging towards the fulfilment of founder Mark Lamberti’s dream of establishing a national hardware chain.

Comment: A living monument to the Great Man theory of retail.

British American Tobacco (BAT) has moved quickly to straighten up the unholy mess of allegations that they spied on competitors and bribed tax and law enforcement officials in their efforts to fight the illegal tobacco trade that is threatening their bottom line. They have a new CEO, Soraya Zoueihid, and one of her first acts has been to fire Forensic Security Services (FSS), the outfit alleged to have been doing the cloak and dagger stuff. In April, former FSS hardman, Stephen Botha, accused BAT of giving FSS the go-ahead to spy on competitors. What seems undisputed right now is that BAT did pay FSS to wage a campaign against illegal ciggies. Both sat on a task force that included representatives from the Hawks, crime intelligence, the State Security Agency (SSA) and the National Prosecuting Authority, and the implication was that money or influence traded hands in this context.

Comment: From the fast boats of Gibraltar to the Marlboro Man, the tobacco trade – legal or not – has always held a certain swashbuckling appeal for those who choose to ply it.

By the time you read this, ceteris paribus (I said no Latin. Ed.), SABMiller and AB InBev will be one, brought together in a glorious union of subtly-flavoured amber liquid, watery froth and shareholder euphoria, if shareholders vote the £79billion merger into being. And if the protest votes being lodged – perhaps – by Aberdeen Asset Management, Vontobel of Switzerland and Ash Park Capital come to naught (Vontobel and Aberdeen hold a combined 2% of SAB stock) the deal needs 75% approval to go through. In the meantime, SARS is waiting with bated breath (Note spelling. Ed) to see whether South African retail investors will opt to use Section 42 of the Income Tax Act and delay paying Capital Gains Tax (CGT) on the profits they’ll get from selling their shares at £45 a pop. 

Comment: Some of us here in Tatler Towers still feel there is something joyless about this brutal collision of two already massive corporate entities.

The Consumer Price Index (CPI) has dipped its aching toes into the cool and refreshing waters of the Reserve Bank’s targeted band for the first time this year. Apart from the immediate – though slight – relief this alone will provide consumers, the suggestion is that the Reserve Bank will hold off on another rate hike this year as a result, providing further comfort for our strapped citizens, who, we are told, are saving half of what they were a year ago even as their level of indebtedness grew to the tune of 5-odd percent. On the upside, says economist Mike “Ah Shucks” Schussler, tourism, gold and exports into Africa were tugging the economy up by its frayed bootstraps, although (downside) population growth was still outstripping economic growth.

Comment: Where then, are the billboards promoting smaller families? Why in God’s name is population such a holy cow?

Pharma giant GlaxoSmithKline has appointed a new CEO, from within the ranks, one Emma Walmsley, which is a damned funny name for a bloke … what? She is? Well, that’s a turn up for the books, and no mistake. Women in the corner office, eh? Whatever next. It’ll be a woman in the top job at one of our own big retailers, any day now. Eh?