An inconvenient truth
The Note doesn’t know which news is worse; that sales of the humble meat pie are on the slide or that the even humbler corner store is racing towards extinction.
For those of us who recall the days when the only place to find a hot pie after 5pm was the local deli, the world is really turning upside down. The Note has not been this worried since fish ‘n’ chips went gourmet and priced itself out of being a staple.
The bad news around pies and shops come from BIS Shrapnel’s food service division, which compared the route trade in the convenience store market (effectively anything that sells food that isn’t a supermarket) in 2012 with its previous study in 2010. Pie sales are down 10 per cent in that period to $79 million. There was no mention as what the consequences were for sauce manufacturers ... The Note promises to delve deeper into this important matter.
Perhaps the more challenging data came from the report’s revelations about store numbers. The service station with convenience store is now the biggest player in the market, leapfrogging the regular petrol station and the corner store. The latter has been creamed, slumping 34 per cent from the biggest group in the market to just 2,725 outlets.
The demise of the deli is reflected in smaller numbers of independent operators; average turnover per corner store shrank from $985,000 to $750,000 in just two years.
Nailing that
Speaking of retail, The Note has always been a bit bemused that, for those attempting a spot of DIY in the Pilbara the drive to Bunnings has been a bit beyond ridiculous. It’s Broome or Geraldton, take your pick for the closest option - quite a journey when you are expanding a mine, putting in a railway or developing a port. Oh for want of a nail.
So thank goodness Wesfarmers has managed to get its Melbourne-based subsidiary to get on with establishing a presence in Port Hedland.
The town is asking for feedback on its decision to sell Bunnings $2 million worth of land.
Moving forward
Given The Note’s core competency is based on, though not strictly held to, an understanding of language and its historically-driven preferences, it ought not surprise consumers of this publication that we have not been completely inattentive when it comes to the person responsible for
Death Sentence (a book reflective of a growing view that public speaking is not sufficiently being employed at a skill level comparable with the other periods in time), and Watson’s Dictionary of Weasel Words.
That person is Don Watson and while his core competency is writing he also employs his voice from time to time. He is speaking next week at the University of Western Australia.