The big news from the Men in Black this week is that one of their lead numbers is to hang up the ceremonial suit: CEO, Guy Hayward will be leaving the business come December 2019. “Guy has guided Massmart through exceedingly challenging market conditions and has worked to position the business for future growth,” says an official communique from the business, which points to the value-added services and shared group logistics services introduced and competitive online offerings in Makro, Game and Builders Warehouse implemented on his watch. We at the Trade Tatler wish Guy well and look forward to seeing the impact of these significant developments in organisational structure, online and VAS on the Group’s operational efficiencies and profit performance going forward. Although there is no word as yet as to Guy’s successor, on the CFO front, taking over from Johannes van Lierop will be Mohammed Abdool-Samad from Illovo – the company that is; we have no idea where he lives. In other Massmart news, the newly-minted Builders Warehouse in Boksburg is a showcase for the future of the brand, with roving payment devices, 3D printing facilities and from a style and selection perspective, a more woman-friendly environment.

Comment: Big news re Mr Hayward; more will surely follow in the days to come.

No slur intended on the fine men and women of the Platteland, but a recent study by the University of New England into the psychological profiles of South African beef farmers shows that they share some of the characteristics of their Australian counterparts. Apart from a general preference for short khaki pants, and one supposes a broad tolerance of horned ungulates, 15% of them are risk averse, 15% are not, and the remainder are persuadable. Why in heck should any of this matter? Under the High Value Beef Project, Woolies is trying to get about 350 small farmers from six South African provinces involved in producing really good meat, for which they will be paid a handsome premium. To bring these farmers into a specification-driven production system, cultural programs are required to help them change their behaviour; hence the study.

Comment: Fascinating stuff. Go forth, you sons and daughters of the soil, and produce high quality beef, for we would eat of it!

Why is Oom Christo so immovable on the price of his high-voting deferred Shoprite shares? The over R3bn price tag, he says, is worth it: Shoprite have obtained a fair and reasonable assessment of the value of the shares to justify the price. The shareholders opposed to the deal, he argues, are the only ones getting media coverage, and he makes nonsense of their claim that that control has no value. From big bucks to Little Checkers, the new promotion by which Shoprite are forging a shortcut to the wallets of punters through the cupidity of their children. Put differently, it is a collectible promo whereby Checkers and Checkers Hyper shoppers across South Africa will be rewarded with a free block pack for every R200 spent in store. Each block pack contains a unit that forms part of a mini Checkers supermarket and once all 35 available packs have been collected, consumers can build an entire Little Checkers store, and start fleecing tiny shoppers of their own by means of collectible promotions. And so on.

Comment: Contemptible stuff, we hear you cry. Perhaps so, but if they’re doing it, it obviously works.

Comment: We’d venture to suggest those two bits of Walmart news are not entirely unrelated…

A tidy set of quarterlies from German giant Beiersdorf, which saw a like-for-like increase in sales of +6% for the first three months of the FY, for total Group revenues of €1.9bn. Breaking it down a little, sales of the posh La Prairie brand grew a whacking +29%, while Nivea grew with perhaps more sustainable modesty at +5%. Africa, Australia and Asia were particularly pleasing markets for the business. How did they manage all of this? “Recognising local consumer and market trends and responding to them on an individual basis helped us boost sales in all regions,” says CEO Stefan De Loecker. The market wasn’t too chuffed when Beiersdorf unveiled their new four-year strategy in February, by which it plans to open up new markets, strengthen product offerings, and accelerate digitalisation.

Comment: Bet they’re laughing on the other side of their face cream now…

How’s cyberspace treating you, Unilever? Check out the numbers: online sales over at Le Grand Bleu are up +47% in 2018 to around €2.49bn, and ecommerce now accounts for about 4.9% of total revenue of €50.98bn compared with 3.3% in the one seven. They’re punting hard through such online outlets as Taobao in China and Amazon in the real world, and have even experimented with their own online platforms, such as the relatively recently acquired Dollar Shave Club. What’s the strategy? “Our focus is to build a balanced ecommerce business model, growing across e-retailers, bricks and mortar online sales and direct-to-consumer businesses,” explains new CEO Alan Jope. They’ve just headhunted Marta Dalton as director of global ecommerce, snatching her away from a similar role at Coca-Cola. 

Comment: It’s all about computers these days. You mark our words.

This we did not want to hear. The Purchasing Managers Index, (PMI) by which the productivity of the manufacturing sector is measured, has fallen to its worst start-of-the-year level since the global financial crisis of 2009, despite a modest uptick in April. Weak consumer demand and the difficulties of operating a factory when you’re not sure if the lights will go off are substantially to blame. April’s increase, from 45 points to 47.2, was driven in part by an absence of load shedding. On the upside, townships around the country are benefiting from the Department of Trade and Industry’s (dti) Industrial Parks Revitalisation Programme, which sees some businesses being attracted back to areas where jobs are most sorely needed. 

Comment: South Africa is a country whose can-do vuma and creative ingenuity – in every field from food to civil engineering – are boundless. We have no excuse for an underperforming manufacturing sector