Blimey NW, that’s you, me and MT in the dog house now.

Does anyone else buy from them do you think ?

If your high street is made up of booming generic coffee shops still serving gash coffee, charity shops and nail parlours – I fail to see how this is a such a success.

We have one amazing artisan coffee shop – in a different league to anything else. Their success is down to hard work and passion as are most artisan businesses, not capatilism.

The generic branded faceless market is one thing – decent quality producers are another.

Now lets just make it clear, I don’t buy over priced crap coffee from Startaxdodgers (the company that argued the staff PAYE was it contribution to the HMRC). My coffee comes from a well known company in Meltham where its organic fairtrade produce is grown in the hills above the Holme and Colne Valley. All just welly wang from where Taylors grows its Yorkshire tea. Our company tries at all time to purchase from UK based suppliers, yes even those owned by foreign companies outside Yorkshire (Lancashire also!). How can we make a living as manufacturers in the UK if we don’t attempt to support other UK based manufacturers. Much of what we make is exported (directly and indirectly), this does not change our purchase local or UK if possible. We see this policy as similar to companies in Germany, Italy and France, rather surprisingly this is respected by many of our customers. I should say that we never miss a chance to inter-trade with a customer, that’s good for us all.

So yep unfortunately I have to buy from tax dodgers but I actively work not too. This includes not shopping at any supermarket.

Just because there is a world glut of steel does not mean the is plenty of the quality stuff. As I’ve probably ranted on about before, Chinese and Indian steel is often excluded from major projects over quality and falsification of certification relating to alloy contents. It don’t look good when your oil instaltion starts pissing crude all over the place or your steel reinforcing bars start to fail on your nuclear power station.
Nissan buys 45% of its steel from PT for the Sunderland plant (Nissans most efficient) as do many other UK car plants (including JLR owned by Tata), they’ll never buy Chinese steel. They will buy from the rest of Europe though.
We buy our steel whenever possible from UK or other European suppliers (£1M/yr), yep it’s not much but I’m proud to be manufacturing in the UK, I’m proud of all the people I work with who make things here. We love it when a low-loader leaves the yard blocking the roads showing what can be made right here in Yorkshire. Its old fashioned what we do, we weld, grind, bend, hit things with hammers and generally make lots of noise. We are the last of the few, we pay our taxes and no one gives a monkeys but those who work here (and their families).

True, but while they don’t sell below costs as Binns was implying (GP margins are @50%)

Oh really…..

How Starbucks employed ‘clustering’ to put its competition out of business

I find it to be too bitter.

Yes really binns. Gross margins are gross margins – if you want to demonstrate how Starbucks price coffee below its cost I will be happy to cede your point. Until then, your point does not hold up to scrutiny. I will ignore the trend this time 😉

Rone, you are correct having a concentration of activities on a narrow type of goods and services is bad. This is the crux isn’t it and the elephant in the room no one discusses with the case of S Wales. But re the artisan coffee makers – I buy from them too – where were they 15-20 years ago? . When Sbucks arrived everyone questioned the idea of selling coffee for a couple of quid. It’ll never catch on …..and now look at the range of businesses it supports. How many industries have seen that rate of growth?

Gross margins are gross margins – if you want to demonstrate how Starbucks price coffee below its cost I will be happy to cede your point

THM – You’re the economist but isn’t a gross margin pretty meaningless in this case?

The gross margins will always be high in this type of business as they pay so little for the product they sell.

Is this the case?

It is what it is. But the point was made that SB sold coffee below their cost in order to put other companies out of business. The fact that they have GP margins (Revenue – COGS/ revenue) of @50% indicates that this is not the case.

But you are correct, they only tell one part of the story. But that happens to the the part in question.

I think its semantics. Both surely fall under anti-competitive practices, or the more accurate description ‘acting like a ****!’, which is applicable to Starbucks, and the Chinese government

But you are correct, they only tell one part of the story. But that happens to the the part in question.

So Binners was correct. They do sell below “cost”.

A huge part of the cost of operating the store does not come off the gross margin, so that the store is really making a loss. Until they squeeze the competition out and increase prices so that they are making a net profit.

Some progress then…

No they don’t. But step back, if they do sell at a price which means that they make losses, what tax should they pay?

They won’t pay any tax on a profit or a loss. Are you somehow unfamiliar with their tax practices?

Anyway, back onto the original topic. An interesting piece by Will Hutton in yesterdays Observer

The dogmas destroying UK steel also inhibit future growth

I’m going to go out and a limb here and guess that THM will be as dismissive of Will Huttons views as he is of Paul Masons 😆

teamhurtmore – Member

No they don’t. But step back, if they do sell at a price which means that they make losses, what tax should they pay?

If we apply the same sorts of measures that the govt applies to humans in a vulnerable position, then obviously we should impose a “dumping” tax on them, plus apply a tax on vacant seats in their cafes, and, oh I don’t know, maybe send in IDS and his cohorts? 🙂

Edit: And here’s another one, hit them with a payroll tax on all zero hours contracts.

The possibilities are endless… 🙂

Interestingly my dad commented last night that if he hadn’t had access to cheaper Taiwanese steel 15 years ago his engineering business would have gone under.

At the time though the Chinese government wasn’t subsidising pretty much the whole cost of production.

Are you somehow unfamiliar with their tax practices?

No thank you, I understand them well. But nice swerve – the usual response to unsubstantiated statements. There is a very clear trend.

Thanks for the link to Huttom. For a change you are 100% correct there. Wide generalisations, flawed understanding of basic econics and factually inaccurate. A perfect Hutton article.

£100 000 on the open market will buy you an annual pension of around 4-5k I guess.

Less than £3k, currently at £37k per £1k it seems – see a previous post by me on the subject.

China is under cutting every other worldwide steel company.

China over charges their own people to make up the short fall while
other worldwide steel producers close down as they can’t compete.

China then charges full price or more to pay off debt.

…flawed understanding of basic econics and factually inaccurate. A perfect Hutton article.

Now then @thm…your critique is nonsensical too…it may not fit your perspective but that doesn’t mean it’s factually incorrect… 🙄

THM just a shame the two big players in coffee you name shirk paying UK taxes in any meaningful manner

THM mentioned Starbucks and Costa.

The former’s tax arrangements are well documented – the latter is part of Whitbread PLC and the amount of corporation tax paid is there for everyone to see in the end of year accounts / annual report.

China is under cutting every other worldwide steel company.

China over charges their own people to make up the short fall while
other worldwide steel producers close down as they can’t compete.

China then charges full price or more to pay off debt.

What prevents other countries or new purchasers just mothballing their own facilities onto care and maintenance until prices go up? Both demand and supply are elastic, It’s not like the equipment involved carries a shelf life or there is significant short term skill fade, the science and processes are well understood.

Now then @thm…your critique is nonsensical too…it may not fit your perspective but that doesn’t mean it’s factually incorrect…

There are factually incorrect statements made in Binners Hutton’s article. It doesn’t matter what perspective it fits. Comments are either supportable by facts or not. Quite simple.

But perhaps Hutton and Mason may believe that having once flown close to the light, their latest hyperbole will bring them renewed glory again.

BTW – reference to SB and Costa is from an industry survey. Not my choices.

have we moved on to the latest subject to moan about now?

I was thinking the same

Important developments in past 24 hrs without comment 😉

Gupta – one condition, I get rid of the blast furnaces
Workers – one condition, we keep the blast funrnances – the breath of the dragon

And will the twain meet?

This seems positive:
BBC: Govt. 25% stake

I hope that in the rush to deliver, Javed has done an appropriate level of due diligence on potential partners or (!) co-investors and that he understands what is meant by “commercial terms”. I have doubts on both scores.

So MBO v sale to relatively unknown group that does have an appetite for blast furnaces. Will there be concerns over taxpayers money “supporting” Johnny Foreigner in this case!?!

I don’t see how a management buyout can make the business work. As the lady employee on the news said last night – if she is being asked to put £10k into the business she is going to want assurances 😐

A government stake looks very risky.