Nick Toscano April 12, 2014 Australia’s tobacco lobby has employed an ex-gangland taskforce detective to investigate Melbourne retailers selling black-market cigarettes and commissioned a report that found the illicit trade has reached record levels. The KPMG report, bankrolled by cigarette manufacturers and obtained exclusively by Fairfax Media, attributes the surge in illegal tobacco to Australia’s high tax rates and the introduction of plain packaging in 2012. International crime gangs also avoided an estimated $1.1 billion in taxes last year by smuggling tobacco through Australian ports, according to the research. But anti-smoking campaigners, including the Cancer Council of Victoria, have slammed the report as ”self-serving rubbish”. ”The release of the second tobacco industry-commissioned report into illicit tobacco in less than six months smacks of desperation. Australia has already introduced plain packaging with Ireland, NZ and the UK now saying they may follow suit,” Cancer Council of Victoria chief executive Todd Harper…

JANE HARPER APRIL 11, 2014 HERALD SUN COCA-Cola Amatil has suffered its biggest single-day market rout in more than two decades after warning of a $56 million hit to first-half earnings. Investors sent the group’s shares plummeting 14.6 per cent on Friday — the heaviest drop for any trading session since the early 1990s. They closed at a four-year low of $9.74. It came as the company announced it would launch a strategic review on the back of weak performances in Australia and Indonesia. Coca-Cola Amatil expects earnings before interest, tax and “one offs” for the six months to June will tumble 15 per cent, from $373.9 million in the same period last year. The only bright spot was the wave of public support for the group’s troubled Victorian fruit processing business SPC Ardmona. Sales in the division surged 10 per cent in the three months to March. Coca-Cola Amatil…

BLAIR SPEEDY APRIL 07, 2014 THE AUSTRALIAN SUPERMARKET giant Coles has agreed to correct misleading claims about the price it paid farmers to supply its dollar-per-litre milk following an investigation by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission. The ACCC said today that it has accepted a court-enforceable undertaking from Coles over its cartoon video “Our Coles Brand Milk Story”, which the retailer promoted on social media YouTube and Facebook between February and May last year. The regulator said it had received complaints from dairy farmer organisations about the video, which was created in response to public concerns about the impact of dollar milk, first introduced by Coles in January 2011, on the price paid to dairy farmers for supplying milk to processors. “Coles represented in a video and cartoon on social media that the farmgate milk price increased from 86c per two litre bottle of Coles-brand milk in 2010-11 to…

The Age April 7, 2014 Coca-Cola Amatil (CCA) is facing new com­petition in the soft drinks market – not from traditional rivals Pepsi or Schweppes but from trendy German bottler Bionade GmbH. Bionade is taking advantage of the lack of innovation in the fizzy soft drinks market by adding an organic cola to its range and expanding into distribution channels dominated by CCA and Schweppes. Part of Germany’s Dr Oetker food group, Bionade is the market leader in the “healthy” soft drinks category in Europe and sells about 500 million bottles a year, mainly in western Europe. It has developed a cult following among German and Dutch expatriates since arriving in Australia a few years ago, but has a low profile in the mainstream commercial beverages market. Karsten Knorr, director of Drinks Beverage Logistics, secured exclusive distribution rights two years ago and, through third-party distributors in each state, has been…

Meg Major Mar 31, 2014 The direct consumer feedback below is part of the final installment in a three-part PG 2014 Supermarket Prepared Foods special report aimed at helping fresh food category leaders seize opportunities in one of the most important parts of the store in terms of fostering stronger shopper engagement, loyalty and overall satisfaction. The full report will appear in PG’s upcoming April issue. What follows are highlights of direct responses shared by ICC/ Decision Services’ online consumer panel of more than 2,300 respondents collected between Feb. 7-8, 2014. Analysis includes cross-tabulations by gender, income, number of people in household and related demographical statistics. Panelists were asked to share candid insights about the following open-ended question: What advice would you give your local supermarket to improve its prepared foods offerings? Make sure the items are stirred often so the top doesn’t dry out. Think about the age of…