Interesting Facts

The number of coffee shops in the UK surpassed 20,000 in 2015, boosting sales by 10pc to £7.9bn.  (Unfortunately this soaring demand means there will be a problem; supply won't be able to keep up, and market experts are predicting a shortage of coffee within the next 3 years.  Strangely the price paid to producers means they aren't likely to want to increase productivity, as according to Mintec, the price of Arabica coffee has fallen by 35pc over the last year. If I run out of coffee, there will be no more sessions.)

There are 142 days to Christmas, but Selfridges have opened their Christmas department. (Why have they opened so early?  To be the first of course.  Well sorry to disappoint you, but there's a Christmas shop in London that is open all year round. I will now go and sack myself.)

It's not normally great news for the hard-working staff of a company if it's doing well, beyond the fact that they might get to keep their jobs, but for Sports Direct staff in the UK, there's an added "bonus" to the announcement from management that profits in 2013 are up 40%. (Sports Direct staff are set to share a £135m bonus, which will net each one of them over £70,000.00. Now, people who run their own business might think the company is insane to do this, but we have a saying in the UK "There's method in his / her madness". Since the scheme was introduced in 2009, the proportion of staff that leave the company each year has halved from 30 per cent to 15.5 per cent.) Source

In France, from July 1, a new law will require shops and offices in France to turn off their lights one hour after the last worker leaves a building.   ( Shop windows may only be lit from 7 a.m. or an hour before opening time, and  shop window displays must be turned off at 1 a.m.   Exceptions will be made during Christmas and other significant events, as well as in some tourist and cultural areas. I wonder what they will do with the Eiffel tower.) Source