Today, thousands of Unilever workers will start 11 days of striking against plans to change their final-salary pension scheme.

Unilever Logo

The strikes are due to take place for 11 days between today and 28th January with 12 different sites participating  including Norwich, Leeds, Manchester and North Wales.

Union leaders “furious”

Members of the Unite, Usdaw and GMB unions are against plans from Unilever to stop their final-salary pension scheme later this year. Union officials are reportedly “furious” at the plans to scrap the final-salary scheme which they claim could lead to cuts between 20% and 40%. However  Unilever has stated that almost 90% of affected staff members will retain 80% or more of their pension.

However the Guardian claims that the staff members are “crazy to strike over their pensions” because their new pension will still rank amongst the most generous this country has to offer.

Longer life-expectancy

Unilever state that the reason they are changing their pension schemes is due to rising costs caused by increased life expectancy and volatile investment returns. The scheme was closed to new starts in 2008 and on the 31st of march 2010, the scheme had a deficit of £680m. The company responsible for Marmite, Pot Noodle, Lynx, Flora and Walls’s Ice Cream said:

“We believe the provision of final salary pensions is a broken model which is no longer appropriate for Unilever… It is our responsibility to protect the long-term sustainability and competitiveness of our business, and to do so is in the best interests of our people.”

The current scheme is a final-salary pension meaning it’s based on your earnings at the end of your career and the number of years worked at the company. Unilever are looking to move to the career average scheme which is based on the average pay over your entire career.

This move by Unilever is just seen as the latest company to shut-down its final-salary scheme. According to the National Association of Pension funds, almost a quarter of these schemes are now closed to new and existing staff members. Oil giant Shell is set to become the last FTSE 100 company to shut-down its final-salary pensions scheme to new workers in 2013.

What is your pension like? You think your company is fair with how much the offer? Let us know…

In this third edition of our monthly Case Study, we bring you ThirtyThree a recruitment organisation, part of the OneAgent global network.

ThirtyThree Logo

The London and Bristol based organisation, has a range of clients including the National Trust, Starbucks and many blue-chip companies and carries out campaigns such as the RBS graduate campaign and the ITV careers campaign. The company has won a number of awards for it’s campaigns including the RBS and Barclays graduate campaigns and a profile raising campaign for Burges Salmon.

Doing their bit for charity
The campaign involved asking students at local schools to take images of ‘their’ Bristol and then collating a book of the images, mailing it out to candidates and then selling it to raise money for a local charity. This shows that ThirtyThree is successful at creating award-winning campaigns for larger brands who want to shout about who great they are, to a more subtle campaign for Burges Salmon.

ThirtyThree Resist the usual campaign

Company growth
In April 2008, ThirtyThree bought over their Bristol competitors RAA, with the help of a financial support package from RBS IF. The growing company needed some additional financing to complete the acquisition so the RBS team compiled a bespoke finance package which included invoice discounting support which allows a company to get money owed to them, before the supplier has paid their invoice.

This meant that ThirtyThree had access to all their own money, earlier than they would normally be expecting, allowing them to complete the acquisition. The company was also able to employ all 42 staff of RAA, joining their current offices in Bristol meaning no one was out of a job.
Commenting on this arrangement, chairman of ThirtyThree, Andrew Young, said:

“Despite the changing economic climate, we are continuing to think long term and make judicious investment decisions. The RBS team worked closely with us to understand our business and support our objectives, while also taking us through a robust due diligence process.”

ThirtyThree is successful due to its ability to keep up-to-date with social media and keeping the website up-to-date. Also being a recruitment business in  tough economic times means that they are needed more than ever to find their clients the best people for the job. They are still continuing to grow, gaining even more new clients through the end of 2011.

Do you know of other businesses performing well in these tough economic times? Let us know in the comment section below.

supermarkets via comedy_nose

BBC’s Panorama investigated pricing and offers at Tesco, Asda, Sainsbury’s and Morrisons and found that most of the ‘offers’ advertised are simply a marketing ploy rather than giving shoppers a real discount. These tactics could potentially be illegal and supermarkets could be prosecuted due to the findings.

Some of the ‘deals’ found to be in potential breach of consumer protection regulations include the ‘Wow’ factor – where some products were no cheaper and others were actually more expensive than they used to be; the multi-buy non-deal – where no saving is made at all; and the ‘bigger pack, better value’ – which actually means that the pack just costs more.

The findings come as the big four are apparently in a ‘price war’ to keep shoppers coming to their stores and not their competitors. Richard Perks, retail analyst, told the BBC Panorama show that:

 “If there was a price war going on at the moment we would have seen profits falling, or we would have severe warnings and that is just not happening. The name of the game is to be as clever as possible in how you promote and how you use your discounts and how you attract your customers … But it seems some customers are no longer convinced by these promotions”

The big four supermarkets, Tesco, Asda, Sainsbury’s and Morrisons own 68% of the UK grocery market with £65 billion going through their tills out of the total £96 billion spent across the market. They all deny attempting to mislead shoppers and all commented that they do their best to keep prices low.

A separate survey found that 4 out of 10 shoppers, said they did not believe the ‘offers’ and ‘discounts’ were true. 31% of those surveyed said that they were even less likely to trust them now than in the past.

Ask yourself these questions:

• Do you actually need what the deal is offering?
• Will you finish it before it goes out of date or do you even need more than one bottle of squash?
• Always look at the unit price of products – is it actually cheaper per litre to buy the bigger bottle?

“Panorama: The Truth About Supermarket Price Wars” will be shown on BBC 1 tonight at 8.30.

European central bank via uggy boy

Some European countries spent too much money, had to borrow some more and now can’t pay it back due to rising interest rates. So we thought we’d look at how we got here. We will continue to update this blog post as more news is announced.

2009

April’09

The EU orders France, Spain, the Irish Republic and Greece to reduce their budget deficits (the difference between their spending and earnings form tax).

October’09

There is much anger towards the previous Greek government over corruption and spending, and George Papandreou’s Socialists win a sudden general election.

November’09

Concerns about some EU member states’ debts start to grow following the Dubai sovereign debt crisis.

December’09

Greece admits that its debts have reached 300bn euro, the highest in modern history. Mr Papandreou insists that his country is “not about to default on its debts”.
Greece is burdened with debt amounting to 113% of GDP, which is nearly double the eurozone limit of 60%. Ratings agencies start to downgrade Greek bank and government debt.

2010

February ’10

As well as Greece, concerns start to build about other heavily indebted countries like Portugal, Ireland, and Spain.
Greek borrowing costs reach record highs, 13.6% of GDP is attributed to the Greek deficit

2011

February ’11 

Eurozone ministers set up a permanent bailout fund worth about £500bn euros.

May ’11

Eurozone and the IMF approve a 78bn-euro bailout for Portugal.

June ’11

Discussions have started around forcing Greece out of the Eurozone.

July ’11

A second bailout for Greece is agreed.

August ’11:

European Central Bank commits to buying Italian and Spanish Government bonds to bring down borrowing costs.
Italy passes a 50bn-euro austerity budget.
The European Commission predicts the eurozone will grow by 0.2%.

September ’11:

Leading finance ministers urge urgent and decisive action to deal with the debt crisis.
Italy has it’s debt rating cut to ‘A’ from ‘A+’.
George Osborne says there are just ‘six weeks’ left to save the euro.

October ’11:

General strike brings Greece to a standstill.
Franco- Belgian bank Dexia receives a huge bailout.
Euro ministers agree Greek bailout.
Slovakia is the 17th and final country to approve the expansion of the eurozone’s rescue fund, two days after rejecting the plan.
George Papandreou’s defies logic with he announces that he will put Europe’s latest efforts to rescue the Greek economy to a public vote. Disappointment and panic spread across the Eurozone.

November ’11:

George Papandreou abandons his plan to hold a referendum, amid scenes of open warfare in his own party.
Lucas Papademos replaces George Papandreou as Greek Prime Minister.
After the Italy’s borrowing rate peaked at 7.40% Silvio Berlusconi stepped down as Italian Prime Minister to restore investor confidence and was replaced by Mario Monti.
G20 leaders meet in Cannes and for the first time, EU leaders admit that it might be necessary for Greece to leave the eurozone if the single currency is to survive.
The US administration has expressed concerns that the Eurozone crisis could damage the US economy.
But world markets were up in response to reports of a proposed fiscal union that would set binding limits on eurozone government borrowing.

December ’11:

President Nicolas Sarkozy called for a new EU treaty to save the single currency in a ‘make of break week’.
Mario Draghi, president of the European Central Bank, has commented that the ECB is ready and willing to help in the fight to solve the Eurozone crisis and it is widely agreed that this is neede.
David Cameron and Nicolas Sarkozy are in talks in Paris to reorganise the Governance of the Eurozone which could potentially lead to a lessening in Britain’s influence. Germany and France are to agree a plan of action on how they are going to stop the crisis.

So what’s next for the Eurozone? Things can only get better. . .right? We’ll be updating this timeline weekly to keep you informed, meanwhile you can share your thoughts about any recent events in our comments section below.

Cards via plastic data card

Plastic Data Card was started in 1992 by Jim O’Carroll who was looking to capitalise on a growing demand and decided to start his own company to make the most of this demand.

The Kent based company supplies a wide range of cards from event passes to membership cards. The company supplies Tesco as well as other blue chip companies. Plastic Data Card has a number of satisfied customers, most  happy with the quick turnaround as Hannah Jones says:

“I was really impressed with the quick service that we received. You guys really stepped up to the plate to ensure our vip badges were delivered on time to a really important event.”

The company, like most small companies starting in this difficult climate, decided to look into using invoice factoring services to keep their business secure but struggled to find financial backing:

“Back then we were a young business. Some finance companies saw us as too much of a risk to offer a full range of credit facilities, so we chose factoring. This early decision has proved to be right – time and time again.

They use these services to get credit checks carried out on new customers submitting large orders. The service also has a bad debt protection element which allows for fast turnarounds and gives the company a competitive advantage.

Managing director Jim O’Carroll, said that the invoice finance service “has been a key part of the way we do business, and has certainly helped us to get where we are today.”

Today the company is keeping up-to-date with modern business and now has a Facebook and Twitter. The company is thriving in a difficult financial market by keeping to traditional business values like a good and reliable service.

Do you know of any businesses which are weathering the economic storm? Tell us about them in the comments section below.

Image by: o5com

The recession has hit everyone hard. From individual people to businesses, everyone is feeling the pinch. Today we are going to look towards a more business orientated view of some money saving options that every business should be looking into.

First up is taxes, perhaps the bain of every small business. There are measures that can be taken to help lower these outgoings.

• Stock valuation – Stock is normally valued at cost, but can be valued at net realisable value if this is a lower figure. If you have stock which can be valued on this basis then this will reduce your tax bill.
• Company cars – You can claim 100% capital allowances for cars which have CO2 emissions of 120g/km or less. Such cars will also produce lower taxable benefits for employees who have company cars.
• Fuel/water efficent equipment – As for cars, if you buy energy/water saving equipment, then 100% tax allowances can be claimed.

These are just a few examples of some commonly overlooked tax breaks that are available to everyone. The next points to look at are how to market your company on a budget. Marketing may take a huge part of your budget but there are ways of obtaining excellent results with a bit of research and thought.

• Embrace web 2.0 – Social networking websites like Facebook, MySpace and LinkedIn are all the rage and are being used by businesses to promote their products and services. A group on Facebook, for example, allows you to network with people looking for the sort of thing your business is offering. Use it to promote your offerings and keep people up to date with the latest content on your website. You could also consider posting promotional videos on sites such as YouTube.
• Share your expertise – There are always thousands of events which need speakers, and publications which need content, so why not offer your expertise? Seek out events and exhibitions focusing on your sector and contact the organisers about being a speaker. Similarly, publications – particularly local ones – will generally be happy to consider articles. Find out the names of local journalists on the publication’s website and get in touch. And if you are particularly knowledgeable sign up to media contact agencies which put journalists in touch with experts in particular fields.
• Testimonials – If you’ve got lots of happy customers, shout about it! Get them to give you a quote saying why they liked your product or service and put it on your website or promotional literature. You should also consider fuller case studies which new customers can read to find out how great your company is. Whatever you do though, don’t make up testimonials. You will get found out!

Web 2.0 and social media engagement are becoming very important in today’s business markets, but to look at a more technical view point, the efficiency of your entire business platform is of the utmost importance. Application modernization is an important process which many businesses are taking advantage of as budgets are slashed. The video below gives a brief explanation of the process.

When it comes down to the brass tacs it is up to you as the business owner to look after its financial affairs. To finish-off, here are some simple but necessary points that every business should be taking care of during this time of the recession.

• Keep on top of your bookkeeping – Don’t be tempted to put-off your paperwork, otherwise you risk forgetting crucial costs or even worse failing to invoice a customer.
• Use technology to help – Do your banking online, it saves time and money. Make sure you check all your bank statements and don’t go over your authorised bank balance limits.
• Make sure you pay yourself and your staff on time – And keep accurate records. Cut down on hassle and worry by keeping up-to-date with tax and national insurance payments.
• Golden rule – Cash is king when you start a business, so plan ahead. Anticipate key costs and save time by scheduling recurring invoices and purchases. This will help you to plan your cash flow and keep good relationships with your key suppliers

I hope that some of these tips will help or make you think about where your business is going, and create a mini-checklist to go through to ensure that you are saving as much as possible in these penny pinching times.

What do you think of our money saving ideas? Do you have any top tips that you can share here? Let us know in the comments section below.

Image via Guardian

Poppy Dinsey, is a 24 year old fashion blogger from Surrey. With her style tips, and her amazing designer clothes, she became an internet sensation when she started posting pictures of herself wearing a different outfit each day. Initially using other social networks to get followers she rose to fame when she finally decided to move in to her own website called What I Wore Today, the website is now a very famous fashion website, where both males and females are given a chance to post their pictures displaying their outfits. Poppy also plans on expanding the site into a social networking site, with a ratings mechanism that allows people to rank the best in fashion, in various cities, through the number of votes they receive. She also hopes to role out an affiliate scheme that will gather a commission from every sale generated for a major brand through her website.

Image via Guardian

Jamal Edwards,  a 20 year old entrepreneur, is the founder of the UK’s biggest Youth Media Channel, SBTV. Jamal founded his company at the tender age of 16, after receiving a camera as a Christmas present. He started out casually filming local rappers and musicians on the streets and would then go on to share thsee videos on his youtube channel. After receiving a good response from his viewers, he decided to make this hobby into a profession. The team he has now set up, are running the biggest youth media channel in the country. Jamal was also featured in Google Chrome’s The Web is what you make of it campaign, and he is now licensed with major record labels.

Image via Guardian

Edwin Broni-Mensah, is a 25 year old Manchester University student, and the proud winner of the most outstanding black student award. He is the founder of GivemeTap, the concept behind the service is to first sell blue water bottles made from recycled aluminium from his website at £7, purchasers can then fill these bottles up with free tap water from participating cafes and restaurants. The bottle is not only portable, but also saves you spending a load of money buying water everyday. The best thing about this business idea is that it helps to reduce the wastage in landfill sites and 70% of the income generated from these water bottle sales go to organizations that help communities in Africa to install clean water pumps. Edwin has plans to offer his bottle’s services in London for the 2012 Olympics.

Image via Your Hidden Potential

Jessica Grosvenor, is a 25 year old entrepreneur from Wolverhampton and the winner of Shell Live Wire Young Entrepreneur of the Year. She founded Freelance Training and Consultancy after working as a freelance teacher for 5 years. Her company now provides training in Health & Social Care and Leadership & Management using certified NHS nurses who were made redundant recently due to NHS facilities.

Image via Your Hidden Potential

Gerard Jones, is a 21 year old Professional Football coach who launched Gerard School of Football at the age of 19 after he was released from his club. Gerard, refused the scholarships and offers to play in professional clubs in the USA, to pursue his career as a full time football coach. His school is now a premier Football School in England, that provides specialist football coaching to boys and girls aged from 5 – 14.

Image via Your Hidden Potential

Suleman Sacranie,  is a 21 year old young entrepreneur from Leicester who rose to fame after starting his company 99pshopper – a budget online shopping website where each item is priced for 99p or below. As the company started to grow and showed some serious potential, Suleman decided to drop out of university to focus full time on his business. His company is now delivering products to households all over Europe.

Image by chris_jacobs_photography via flickr

A select number of corporate jets and commercial airlines will be awarded free carbon allowances, in light of the new expenses caused by the Europe Commission’s new carbon emissions trading scheme. The new arrangement will see airlines having to produce a permit for every tonne of carbon dioxide emitted by their aircraft. This has been met with mixed responses as it could be seen to raise the cost of flying for millions of passengers around the globe.

In order to prevent businesses from becoming immediately economically unviable, the scheme will be allocating a certain amount of credits, to ease organisations into the process.

Most notably, British Airways have been granted 10.34 million free carbon permits next year, which has been estimated as 6 percent of the granted to all EU airlines. This is the largest allocation by far, coming from an overall pot of only 56.7 million to be divvied up between 249 UK-based airlines.

According to the figures, the UK’s carriers will receive one third of the total permits being shared among the countries spearheading the EU emissions trading scheme.

In addition to commercial airlines, several corporations who operate private jets will be included in the emissions allocation. These include ExxonMobil, Starbucks, Coca Cola and McDonalds.

The European Commission has announced that the allowances for this new scheme will be staggered, with 900 airlines receiving help to meet targets in 2012 (0.6797 carbon allowances per 1,000 tonne kilometre flown), but this will drop to 0.6422 allowances from 2013 through to 2020.

The chief worry is that the additional costs of this levy will passed down to the customers, but this remains to be seen.

What do you think of the emission trading scheme? Do you think it is fair? Let us know in the comments.

Pic by mnem

Swirling winds, rugged landscapes and hillsides covered in heather are epitomised as the symbols of Scottishness by Scotch whisky companies, but this image is predicted to have a detrimental effect on the industry over the next five years.

The Dark Spirits report by market researchers Mintel has predicted that UK sales will drop 10% by 2016 because the current images of “heather and weather” is off-putting to younger drinkers. There’s a much greater sense of ceremony with Scotch, partly because they think it should be drunk neat compared to imported US whiskies which are more commonly mixed with the likes of cola or ginger ale.

Thanks to a spike in demand in emerging markets such as Brazil and Japan, exports have risen by 60% over the last 10 years, but in the UK sales have been falling.

There has been a general decline in alcohol sales in the UK, but the report suggests that Scotch is being hit particularly hard due to its image. It is often seen as a drink for dad, so despite some more up-to-date marketing campaigns from whisky companies, contemporary packaging, and attempts to target younger shoppers, its antiquated image could still see it lose more than £300m over the next five years.

Younger drinkers and women generally prefer drinks with a sweeter, more approachable flavour profile, but in 2010 a survey by ASDA found that 33% of the supermarket’s female shoppers were buying whisky, and that 60% of the women question had developed a taste for it through their husbands. More than half were also choosing to drink it neat, helping to partly dispel the male-dominated stereotype.

A senior drinks analyst for Mintel has said that major brands such as Glenfiddich and Talisker, which are owned by drinks giant Diageo, “have been guilty of focusing on ‘heather and weather’ imagery rather than more personable identity projected by the likes of bourbon import, Jack Daniel’s. Such a focus is far from emotionally engaging and feels somewhat tired.”

According to the report, overall UK whisky sales will fall from £2.55bn to £2.25bn by 2016 with Scotch bearing most of the brunt, while the sale of US imports such as bourbon are actually bucking the trend by showing a growth in sales.

There may be tough time ahead for the UK market, but a report last month by the SWA (Scotch Whisky Association) showed a 22% increase in exports for the first half of 2011, a surge which is a direct contribution to the Scottish government’s target of a 50% increase by 2017. This overall increase is the result of a burgeoning market in Asia which rose by 33% to £423m, and in Central and South America exports leapt nearly 50% to £214m. The world’s two biggest Scotch markets, the US and France, rose 14% to £268m, and 13% to £220m respectively.

Do you think the Scotch whisky industry needs a makeover? Go to our comments section below and tell us what you think would make it more appealing.

Image by David Singleton

The latest report from the High Pay Commission has revealed that on average annual bonuses for FTSE 350 directors have gone up 187% since 2002. However, this isn’t reflected in company performance, as share prices have gone up only 21% in the same time frame.

Nine years ago, executive bonuses were worth around 48% of their annual salary, but they are now worth a whopping 90%. Add that to the average salary increase of 64% in the same time period, you get directors enjoying an annual bonus nearly three times fatter than what they received in 2002.

In the meantime, average share prices in the FTSE 350 have only gone up 21%, while pay for the average worker in the UK has only gone up 27%.

This goes to show that bonuses may not necessarily be reliant on good business performance. Deborah Hargreaves, chairman of the High Pay Commission, agrees: “There has been massive growth in what has been termed as performance-related pay yet no such corresponding leap forward in company performance.”

She also admits that changes to bonus schemes have been able to mask what executives really get paid. “Corporate governance reforms attempting to link pay with performance appear to have done little more than add to the huge complexity of executive packages, reward schemes and bonuses that make up the pay of FTSE 100 directors.”

This news is sure to irritate the average taxpayer, as these increases also apply to directors of failed banks who crashed the economy around three years ago. In fact, the average total earnings of directors in state-supported banks were just under £4m last year, compared with £1.7 million in 2000, an increase of 130%.

Are big directors getting paid too much? Let us know what you think in the comments section below!