241 Reasons Why Newspaper Publishers Need To Understand Newsagents Better

The Daily Telegraph Awaiting Construction

I knew yesterday morning when I was confronted with 30 slippery bundles of the Saturday Daily Telegraph magazine polybags that this morning was going to be a challenge both for me and our newspaper delivery staff. Each polybag weighs a stonking 984g and the total weight of the paper is 1.837kg.

Completely stupid. We get paid just 2p per insert for finishing off the weekend papers only on the copies sold. It has been 2p since 1982, 27 years. To bring back the 'handling allowance' to its original value we need an inflation adjusted rise to 5.2p per item inserted. Today's Daily Telegraph came to us in 4 parts.

Nearly a quarter of the total weight is made up of loose third party inserts with a John Lewis catalogue the heaviest at 180g and a Robert Dyas one at 83g. We should get paid a 'fee'  at some stage for these two TPI's on our home delivered copies.

Three questions:

Why has the NFRN not been able to negotiate any improvement on their scale table since February 2007? Des O'Dwyer from News International  told me last year that a new deal on TPI payments was 'imminent', and that would include accumulative weights, but clearly nothing yet.

Why do the newspaper publishers think that they can treat their front line team so appaullingly?

Why do newsagents accept being dumped on?

Does This Include Us?

Marks & Spencer boss Sir Stuart Rose has been talking about the state of the UK economy and in particular the dreadful state of Government finances. He says:

'VAT – which is set to rise from 15pc to 17.5pc on January 1 – could be increased again next year as whichever party wins the general election looks to balance the national accounts. We are skint as a country and the Treasury needs revenue so I would not rule it out, this Government and the future Government have got to make some hard decisions about refilling the coffers.'

My friend, Wat Tyler  at Burning Our Money  has been looking at the mess that this Government is still creating with the Bank of England's printing presses running at 24/7 pushing £200 billion into the economy. So far it is making no difference to our business with the last 12 months the toughest we have faced.

The real worries are the increase in VAT that is due on January One and the physical implication of changing hundreds if not thousands of prices. Our SparPos store management system will help with this work for the Capper supplied lines, but we will have to deal with our other suppliers ourselves, including Greetings Cards.

The next worry is the sheer scale of the reduction in Government expenditure that must happen post the 2010 General Election. Unless of course Labour win again! Whichever happens the reigning in of the current splurge will have consequence and I am sure we will feel it even in our affluent community.

And then there is the potential for inflation to return, and I remember the 1970's and the lessons of that period of high inflation. Its about the bottom line and volume not just price inflated sales.

The question for us is how do we prepare ourselves for the worst of what may be coming?

Calling Time On Underage Sales: Off To A Round Table

Tomorrow I will be attending a round table forum on tobacco and the display ban. It should be interesting and I hope that I have some useful things to add to the debate. Certainly the opportunity to meet Jeremy Blackburn from JTI will hopefully give me a chance to discuss my ideas about helping independent retailers get better at defending their businesses when it come to underage sales.

I understand representaives from the Tobacco Retailers Alliance will be there so maybe we can get together to share ideas on this issue as well.

I will post again on Friday.

A New Look

While recovering from our recent burglary we have also been progressing with our membership of Spar. In a little under a month we have had installed and are learning to use a 2 lane SparPos scanning system, been rebranded, changed all our shelf edge labels, changed our range from Londis to Spar and more besides.

Although many things are different, much is the same. Our customers are still coming through the door, selecting their purchases and paying at the till. Our staff have got to grips with a new till with its differences including broadband speed card transaction.

We are having to do ‘manual ordering’ while the system learns what we sell, but the stock keeps arriving and the hand held unit that came with the system is proving very easy to use in putting orders together. In fact it is vey useful for many stock related activities.

Last week we set up our first set Spar promotional offers, much easier than we were used to as the offers are downloaded on to our system automatically by Capper. The only things we have to do is set up the merchandising and put out the new shelf edge cards & posters. Last week I know that I saved around half a day and the promotions are set up accurately.

So far so good, but it is all looking good.

Letter To The Minister, Again

I have written to you on several occasions about my concerns regarding the 'Other People' that children usually buy their cigarettes from. You have chosen to dismiss the observations that I have made about 2008 Smoking, Drinking and Drug Use among Young People research.

My wife and I now have real experience on the issue. At 1.15 am on Wednesday 21st of October our shop was burgled. We live over our store and when the burglar alarm went off we rushed down into the shop and were confronted by 3 intruders who were emptying our tobacco display unit.

Even though we beat a hasty retreat back into our house and slammed to connecting door shut the experience left us both very traumatised. The thieves got away with round £1100 of cigarettes and tobacco, but caused around £9,000 of damage to the shop front door and inside the shop. To return our shop and ourselves to a condition that would allow us to reopen took three days, a further cost to our insurance company.

This crime was not some petty spur of the moment robbery; it was the second of three similar crimes during the same night and just one of 15 across West Sussex during a 14 day binge. Robberies of this nature have become endemic over the past year or two. The question is why?

This is a crime driven by taxation and criminals have built distribution networks over the past decade and more to channel the cigarettes and tobacco that were first being purchased cheaply from EU counties that had not instigated the high tobacco tax policies of the UK. More recently tobacco and cigarettes have been smuggled from outside the EU from countries such as the Ukraine.

Over the past year Customs and Excise have had some success in slowing the rate that smuggled tobacco has been entering the UK and this has left the criminals short of cheap cigarettes to sell on in places like the Tab Houses in Newcastle as recently reported on by the BBC. The criminals have now resorted to attacking retailers like us and getting their supplies for ‘free’.

Following the recent event in our store it has become very clear to me that criminals make up a significant part of the ‘Other People’ that sell to children. It is also clear to me that the country’s enforcement authorities, trading standards, do not have a real understanding of how to control this illicit form of distribution.

So back to the question I asked some weeks ago, are you able you tell me how often children use each of their sources of supply.

Yours hoping for a proper reply,

Where Are The Trade Associations On This Crime Epidemic?

Last week Andrew called in to see us, he's the NFRN's Area Manager and was undertaking his pasteral care role following our burglary. Andrew was very sympathetic and told me that other Federation members had suffered similar problems.

This visit will help us along the journey that we are on and is a reflection of the caring organisation that the NFRN is. But I have taken a look at NFRN Online and could not find any mention of the current crimewave that is effecting small/independent newsagents and convenience stores. In fact in their retail guides there is nothing on store security.

I also looked at the ACS , FBS , TRA  and the TMA  websites and nothing.

All that seem to be interested is the tobacco display legistation and smuggling. As my wife and I have personally experienced of the issues I will be writing to these organisations to ask if they are aware of the wide scale nature of this type of crime.

Calling Time On Underage Sales: The BBC Reports From Newcastle

Several customers told me about this report on the BBC yesterday. I will come back to this on another day.

Tobacco control is like trying to squeeze jelly in your hand, demand will always find a supplier. 

Now they are clearly criminals.

What Can We Do To Prevent Another Attack?

They came through here

This website gives guidance about what to do to improve retail security. We thought that we were secure, but our front door proved not to be up to the task and the locked tobacco display unit was no obstacle to the thieves. So what next:

1. We have asked for quotes for security shutters to be installed across our front door.
2. We are having conversations with JTI and ITL about replacing the display unit for one with an up to date security specification.
3. We are improving our CCTV so that we have infrared capability on the shop floor.
4. We have installed a CCTV monitor near to our alarm entry panel so that we can see that the shop floor is safe before we enter.
5. We are looking to get our alarm system improved to give us extra confidence about our personal safety.
6. We have reviewed our response plan to ensure that our safety is the priority.

Burglary Gets Coverage In Convenience Store

The Convenience Store trade magazine has a report  on the raids on the our store and the Londis shop in Pulborough.

JTI Gets Our Tobacco Display Unit Repaired

New Locking Bar

Yesterday a service engineer from JTI called to fix the display unit 'security' shutter. Its now back in working order, but some how I no longer have a great deal of faith in it.

Mahendra Jadeja sent me this in an email yesterday:

'Just thought that if it's possible then either manufacurer add contact point with shutter and connected to existing alam system or add extra security measure so non authorised person open tobbacco display unit then give some high pitch noise. These are my thoughts for next few years.'

If thugs can easily get in to our current display unit with an axe, then clearly these units need to be made more of a challenge.

15 Sussex Stores Burgled In Two Weeks

This morning Simon, the rep from Imperial Tobacco came to visit after hearing about our traumatic experience last week. He brought the shocking news that 15 stores had been burgled in the past two weeks and cigarettes stolen from all of them.

He did not say where they are or if any other owners had confronted the theives, but its 15 stores that have faced the disruption and 15 communities that feel violated.

And this is in the two weeks since our glorious mps voted to ban the open display of tobacco in legitimate shops like mine!

Our Disaster Recover Plan Was All In Our Heads

Emptied

One hears much about the need for businesses to have a business continuity and disaster recovery plan. Like I suspect most independent shops in our sector we had never really thought about it. After all 'it won't happen here, will it'.

We found out last Wednesday morning that it most certainly can happen here in all to brutal reality. Clearly our initial reaction of entering the shop floor was wrong, it put both of us in danger and I will post soon on what we are doing to improve the security of both the premises and more importantly ourselves.

The photographs show why opening on Wednesday morning was out of the question as the counter area was the crime scene and needed to be left untouched until the police SOCO team had finished with it.

Securing the store was clearly the first priority as the front door could not be locked as they had been destroyed by the intruders. The Police arranged for the shop front to be boarded up at around 4 am. A phone call to Stuart, one of our new friends in Spar got a shop fitter to us Wednesday afternoon and he tidied up the door, removed the smashed locks and provided some battening to wedge the sliding door shut. Although new locks are now in place we will continue to board up each evening until the door is replaced.

Having made the decision to close this clearly impacts on our employees. We knew that there was nothing that they would be able to do on Wednesday. We needed to contact them to let them know what had happened and to tell them not to come in to work that day. We also had to work out when we needed some staff and who to help us bring the shop back to readiness for when we reopened.

Another issue was letting our customers know why we were closed. I created an A3 poster that said that we had been burgled and then replaced it with a second one that advised them that we would be closed until Saturday

Next it was suppliers. The first call I made was to the Smiths News night manager some time after 2 am as they are one of our two key business partners and we could foresee a major disruption to our ability to sell newspapers on Wednesday. At best we were only going to run our delivery rounds.

We were due a delivery from Capper, our Spar wholesaler during the morning and knew that with no staff we would not in a position to accept it. A call to their Hastings supply centre enabled us to delay most of the goods until Thursday with only the frozen product being dropped on Wednesday.

The daily suppliers like Kerry Foods and Jengers Bakery arrived as usual. The Kerry rep was sympathetic and left saying that he would call on Thursday to check what our plan was. After a phone call to the bakery the Jengers driver left that days order as there was nothing else that could be done.

Allied Bakery and Greencore (sandwiches) arrived and we accepted the deliveries, not much else could be done with those.

Later on Wednesday when we had decided that we could not be ready to reopen until Saturday we let the suppliers know to stop the orders for the next two days. The exception was Smiths News who continued to supply and we continued to deliver to our HND customer. The Crawley House team said that it was much easier to protect our future supplies by getting their system to ignore our returns than try to cut our supplies then try to add them back.

Next on the agenda was the shop floor recovery. We had stock, rubbish, broken glass, over turned fittings and a wine stained floor to sort. We also had the issue of out of date product to keep up with, a lot of it. Two staff were organised to come in on Thursday to deal with the delayed Capper delivery and sort some of the mess. Our son Robert dealt with the glass and the floor.

Insurance needed to be dealt with and a call to our broker told me who to phone and a conversation with the insurers claims line put the process in action We are still getting our stock loss lists together and our new SparPos system is being very helpful in that task.

Our personal well being is also a vital element for the business recovery and continuity, without us there isn’t a business. The process of healing after this type of experience is very much helped by talking to people, family, friends, suppliers, customers, in fact almost anyone that is willing to listen. And then there is time.

We decided that we needed to give our self some space so Friday we took time away from the shop and went out for lunch and a walk at one the lovely National Trust properties that there are in Sussex.

Finally, a look at improving our security. The intruders gained access to our shop by forcing the locks on the front door so we have investigated roll down shutters and are getting a quote. On a personal level we will never enter the store again if the alarm goes off in the middle of the night or any other time when we have locked it up.

We are already looking to improve our cctv system with inferred cameras covering the sales floor as well as replacing our external camera with a higher quality version. We will be fitting a monitor by our alarm panel so that we can check the sales floor is clear before we open our house/shop dividing door and I will always switch the lights on in the shop before entering.

I will be talking to the Post Office to review our alarm system. Last Wednesday I needed a panic button on the house side of the dividing door and we don’t have one. We may also need to have the front door monitored on the alarm system.

After our experience last Wednesday I know that none of this is over the top and more importantly I will need to have a file with all the ‘what to do in a disaster’ information all in one place and then have copies of it in more than just one place.

In many ways we were fortunate, but much of the good fortune comes from the fact that we have built a strong supplier and customer relationship over the 20 plus years that we have owned our business. When disaster strikes the investment in time and effort certainly bares fruit.

People To Tell, Things To Do

This morning I have spoken to the West Sussex County Times to tell them that as we were closed on Friday we will have a lot of last week edition going back in the returns. The lady that I spoke to is someone we have know at the paper for many years and she fully understood the situation.

Next the shopfitter arrived to fit new locks and while he was with us I asked him to measure up for a secruity roller shutter. We needed to check the shop plans as there is not enough head room above the front door to fit the housing in so we will need to have it fitted out of sight. Lots of questions about type, style, finish etc. Measuring done he said that his boss will be sending us a written quote along with the shop door replacement.

A question that came up was, do we need planning permission for roller shutter? A call to our District Councillor to ask him to find out dealt with that and he offered his support and sympathy on hearing about the burlary.

And then there is getting our lists of losses together. Our SparPos system came with a hand held unit that is being positively useful in creating the evidence that we need to claim for the stolen tobacco & cigarettes, £1,100, the damaged stock and the shortdated products that have now nolonger saleable.

I just checked with the Smiths News House Manager to ensure that our huge level of unsolds last week will not harm this weeks supply.

PS My son has just told me that an item that he posted to one of his customer on Saturday arrived this morning. As he said 'That ain't bad at all!'

We Are Victims Of Scumbag Britain

We Don't Expect Justice From Him

Twelve and half years of Britain ruled by a government with gordon brown at the controls has lead to my wife and I and most other newsagents being both attacked by the law of the land and being failed by it. The burglary that left us in a state of terror last Wednesday is not an isolated incident. A search on Google reveals that this is an epidemic that is ravaging small retail across the UK.

THIS IS BEING DRIVEN BY THIS INCOMPETENT GOVERNMENT WITH THEIR REMARKABLY CORROSIVE POLICIES TOWARDS TOBACCO.

1. The Duty escalator that pushed UK tobacco/cigarette prices way above prices in mainland Europe. Where was the cross EU approach that would have made this more likely to work without the result of opening up an opportunity for criminal?

2. A decade and more of 'not noticing' that criminal networks were been established through out the UK to distribute imported/smuggled from nearby Europe or elsewhere and certainly not taking decisive action.

3. The crack down on imported/smuggled cigarettes thats 'success' has left the criminal distributors short of stock so legitamate retailers are being robbed to feed their supply chain.

4. The continued assault on legitimate bricks and mortar retail through more and more aggressive legislation that does not tackle the other routes of tobacco distribution.

5. A Justice Secretary who thinks the tobacco crime is a Department of Health issue.

Well Mr Brown, Mr Straw, Mr Johnson and the rest of this out of touch government you have all managed to create a country where even in 'pleasant' rural Sussex organised crime is running amuck with little worry of being caught and even less worry of being punished at a level that will be a deterrent. 

My wife and I on the other hand, now jump at every unexpected sounds, are terrified that our recent experience will be repeated and still worry constantly that due to some slip we will be made criminal by the 1991 and 2008 Acts and we know what our penalty will be for that.

The Crime Effects Our Whole Community

My wife and I are not the only victims of the burglary that was visited on us in the early hours of Wednesday. It has had an effect on much of the community. Over the past few days we have recieved many cards and letters expressing sympathy and support. These words are a reflection of the main sentiments expressed.

'Dear Lynda and Steven

We  are so sorry to hear of the frightening ordeal which took place at Cherilyn on Wednesday: we give thanks that you weren't physically injured.

The Village Shop and Post Office has a special place in our hearts due to both of you; in a way we all feel violated that this robbery took place proving that no area is imune from crime.

Well done to Jane and Judy for their help in getting the shop ready to open on Saturday.

We send our kind regards to you.'

When the sort of event that took place in our shop on Wednesday happens it leaves one wondering if its worth doing what we do. The support that these customers are showing along with all the others that are being so kind is helps us get through the challenge of picking up and carrying on.

Saturday Evening, 6.40 pm

Well, we got through the trading morning. I wasn't as organised at opening time as I though I should be, no cash draws in the till! I guess the last few days have been more disorientating than I thought.

My son and I removed the boarding across the front door just before opening time at 7 am and the customers started coming in as soon as I unlocked. And the comments, questions, best wishes and thanks started to follow immediately.

We had suffered some power failures Thursday evening so the Post Office counter terminals needed to be reset before we could start serving and it was after 9 am before we were ready. Fortunately on of our week day staff volunteered to cover this post this morning so I was not tied to the counter.

We had a very busy morning with a great many of our customers wanting to spent some time with both my wife and I offering sympathy and encouragement. Some of these conversations were quite emotional.

More cards and flowers arrived during the time we were open which is clearly a positive sign of the esteem that the community.

Half a day though was more than enough today. We will do our normal 8 am till noon tomorrow.

The Insurance Claim

Thursday morning the Insurance Loss Assessor came to call. He at phone on Wednesday to make an appointment and to advise us to get the urgent issues dealt with like making the premises secure working on the basis as if we were not insured. Our contacts in Capper arranged for the shopfitters who had only been with us the last week to send their shopfront man along on Wednesday.

The Loss Assessor was very caring in his approach and after listening to my description of the buglary started his fact gathering. I was able to show him our policy schedule and that helped him understand the extent of our cover. He asked about turnover, gross profit margin, if we are VAT registered and the extent of the likely claim.

Fortunately we had put a list together that we thought would need to be claimed for. The door, the display unit, the till, the stolen cigarette & tobacco and the damaged stock. We also listed our three day closure with it resultant loss of business and any short date stock that is nolonger saleable.

We were able to give him some broad term estimates, but when one is asked to do these thing while going through the turmoil of this type of crisis it is difficult to get all the facts together. There was clearly nothing that fazed the man and he even stated that he thought that we were very organised it the way we are working through this challenge. Comforting.

His final act was to measure the building to check that were are adequately insured. He had previously asked if we check that the stock values we hold are reflected in the insured figures. I assured him that we have our shock counted profestionally every year.

Next we will get an email (rather than a letter due to the postal workers strike) that will list the evidence that the insurance company will need to see if they are to settle the claim.

We have been burgled before, about 19 years ago, so have a memory about what they are likely to need.

A Call To Our MP's Office

On Thursday I phoned Nick Herbert's office at Westminster and spoke to his PA Gloria. I have been emailing my MP on tobacco, Post Office and other small shop issues since he was elected. This was the first occassion I have been this direct. I felt that he should kow what had happened.

Gloria listened actively to what I told her about our experience on Wednesday morning and was very sympathetic in what she had to say. When I mentioned that I felt that the burglary was an illustration of the failure of governments entire tobacco control strategy she agreed that this was what the Conservative party viewed the Health Bill Clause 21 as a mistake.

After talking for 10 minutes or so the conversation closed with her saying that she knew that Nick does want to come and visit soon.

With in two minutes I had an email from her saying that she had spoken to her Nick who was horrified with what had happened to us. In fact he asked if he could come and see us personally yesterday, Friday if that was not to soon.

I hope that I can arrange a visit soon as clearly we are victims of what the department of health call 'Other People'.

Support From Other Suppliers

We have several daily suppliers that our enforced closure has effected. First on the scene was the Kerry Foods roundsman Richard. He understood immediately that we would need a few days of closure as he had had a similar experience in a previous job.

Our local baker delivered as usual as there was nothing we could do to stop it. We gave half of it away as there was no way of selling it. We did speak to the bakery and stop Thursday and Friday's supply.

Greencore arrived with only the second delivery of Spar sandwiches and we arranged for the Friday delivery to be delivered as normal as they would be the only sandwiches we would have available for Saturday.

Allied Bakery normally deliver Monday, Wednesday and Friday so the Wednesday supply came and will be added to our insurance claim. Friday's bread went on sale this morning.

We were able to stop most supplies, but goods like bread, milk and other fresh produce has a limited shelf life and will not go on the insurance claim.

Saturday Morning, 6.40 am

I have just finished puttting the morning papers together and have checked the shop to ensure that it is ready for customers. Our front door is still boarded up and I am feeling just a little unsure of what we are going to face this morning.

The message that my wife and I have put together will be on the counter to give out to customers and we will have enough staff to allow us to leave the shop floor if and when we need to. I do feel a bit stressed about what may happen during the next few hours, but we will only have to have this 'first day back feeling' once.

Tomorrow should be easier.

On the positive side Paul from the Telegraph phone on Thursday and offered positive help. They have provided a free gift for all our casual Telegraph customers and the boxes of umbrellas and mugs arrived yesterday morning.

I will post later on how this morning goes.

We Reopen, A Message To Our Customers

After three days of being closed it time to face our public again. To help us through the challenge we are distributing this message with our papers tomorrow. We will also have it available at the counter to save us going over our dreadful experience too many times.

On The Front Page

We Must Have Done Something Right

My wife and I have been recieving a great deal of sympathy from our customers in person, in letters, cards and on the phone since the burglary happened. We have also had several bunches of flowers arrive at our door.

Yesterday a basket of wonderfully tasty fruit scones was delivered along with a card. On it our near neighbough had penned the following:

'So sorry about your ordeal,

The village seems so quiet with your shop closed.....

you really are the "heart of the village"

and it seems empty & lost without your cheerful faces,
day in, day out.

Thinking of you - have a good rest and

take comfort that so many people miss you
and care about you.

Remember the nice people far out number the nasty ones.'

It is only when a crisis or trauma strikes that one discovers how the people that one meets everyday really see you. Recieving notes like this shows the great depth of appriciation and good will that has built up by our 20 years of service to the community.

Support from Our New Business Partners

We only joined Spar last week with our new scanning tills going in to action and the new facsia being installed last Friday, but this made no difference to the excellent level of support that the Capper group have given us since Wednesday. Our journey to Spar took six months of regular meetings and phone contact so when I phones Stuart Ware on Wednesday morning I had a good idea of how he would react to our call for help.

The intruders had damaged the shop front door, damaged the tobacco display unit and the shop was looking a mess. Like all the people that I we have discussed our crisis with he was most interested to know how my wife and I were. That covered it was asking what practical help we needed.

The first call was more about talking to some one that we trust about the trauma. Later in the moring I phoned again with some more specific issyes that he could help with like do Capper have someone who they can contact to sort the front door issues or our tobacco display unit.

Phone calls followed from David Smith the store development engineer and the their prefered shop fitter who said his shop front man would be with us within two hours.He arrived and secured the front door on a tempory basis. While he was with us he measured up for a replacement.

We also had a call from our Capper rep who asked if there was anything that we needed him to do for us and to let us know that he had been in contact with Imperial Tobacco to ask them to contact us about possibly replacing the JTI unit.

We were expecting a delivery from Capper on Wednesday so I made a call to there Hasting distribution centre to ask if it could be delayed until Thursday. A short while later I took a return call and was told that the lorry was already out on the road, but the driver had been contacted. The only issues about not taking the delivery was the frozen part of the order. I quickly agreed  that we could take that and when the lorry arrived we were able to deal with the stock speedily.

One of our new tills was damaged by the intruders and needed to be replaced so Steve the IT man was one of the callers that followed up my initial conversation.

Great support though our crisis as both Stuart and other members of the Capper team have kept in touch or dealt with the issues that have confronted us as we move our business back to a condition where we can open again.

More Police Attention

Almost as soon as the Detective Inspector had arrive to take statements 2 office from the Police Scientic Unit were at our door step. They had come to analise the crime scene that we had left undistruded since the burglary.

As my wife and I were being interviewed by the Detective Inspector our son took the 2 SOCO officers into the shop so that they could dust, latent lift finger prints, photograph and take the evidence of the crime. The two officers were with us for around two hours and give the crime scene a complete check.

They ended their visit by taking our finger prints for elimination purposes. The ink that is uses is on a sheet, different to the last time my prints were taken, but just as messy. They left us with enough kits to take our staff members prints along with a couple of Capper employees who had been behind our counter last week.

Another part of the crime journey done.

A Second Wave Of Police

This is not our first experience with a burglary, but one is never really prepared for the stream of activity that follows on from a crime. After the first response from the police that happened within minutes of our 999 call the is the evidence gathering.

First to arrive yesterday was a Detective Inspector who came to take an official statement and to take a look at the scene of the crime. The detective is a man skilled in his job and he initially took me though the early morning incident building a list of my memories and ensuring that I was at easy with the statement process.

I was surprised at some of the features and actions that he drew out particularly my actions to make my wife & I safe and enable us to retreat to a secure place, our home. Going through the list of remembered items the detective crafted a three page statement in the language of evidence. The process took over an hour and include making further statement about the fact that we had provided a copy of our cctv recodings.

during the visit he told us about how wide a scale this crime wave that we were caught up in is. The investigation is across several county and is being takev very seriously.

Last night three more Sussex retailers were robbed.

Postmaster's Support Line

Post Office Ltd have a national business support centre (the NBSC) for Postmaster's to get guidance on all issues regarding running a Post Office branch. I have phoned them dozens of time on a large number of issues so that I could provide best service to my customers and gain knowledge.

The call I made yesterday was much more important as I needed to report our break in. The lady who took my call was already aware of our burglary as details had been emailed to the NBSC by the alarm monitoring company.

When I started to relate what had happened I became unexpected emotional to the extent that it took me some moments to become able to say which branch I was phoning about. The main thing that the lady on the other end of the line was able to do was listen and make reassuring comments.

One of the things that we talked about was the fact that we were not open and the business letting our nearby colleagues know that we were closed. I was also told that details would go out on the Grapevine to warn others. (I will have to look back at the Grapevine emails to see if I missed anything.)

Late in the day I received another call from the support centre as I had clearly concerned them with the state I was in during the first contact. During the conversation I was made aware of the Post Office trauma counselling service and ask if I need to have someone come out and visit us.

Yet late still after my wife and I had discussed how we are feeling and how look we needed before we think that we will be recovered enough to face our customers again I phoned the help line again to tell them that we would remain closed until Saturday morning. I was told that there is no pressure of rush to reopen and that we are listed as being on indefinite closure. Again I was offered the counselling service.

To put our condition into perspective I am aware that this week Mrs Hodson-Walker  has been in court giving evidence about the murder of her son Craig. My wife and I have come through our ordeal unharmed if a little shaken and that is what we need to focus on.

We Delivered The Newspapers

Sometime after 2am yesterday morning I phoned Smiths News Crawley House night manager, Nic to tell him that we had a problem. Nic is a former police office so I knew that I would get a helpful response. Apart fom his sympathy he advised on the best approach to ensure that the incident does not damage our supply levels for the next few weeks.

The delivery arrived just after 5am and I dealt with the newspapers and magazines and put the round together for the delivery staff. All our delivery customers recived their papers as normal. This saved us a great many phone calls from the customers on a day when we knew that we would be making and recieving a lot of calls.

As we did not open we had about half of our supply unsold and tied up 7 bundles of returns for collection this morning.

I had 2 more conversations with Nic yesterday and he has advised that we should leave our supply as it is during our crisis. He also told me that he had inform Steve, the House Manager about our burglary and how we are managing the challenges.

We will stay in touch over the next week or 2 to ensure that our supply levels are not damaged.

Support from trade partners is very important in difficult circumstances and Smiths News reaction has been as good as one would hope for.

A Traumatic Day

I can't say that we enjoyed today. The aftermath of a burglary is significant. As I stated on my previous post it started with our alarm going off at 1.15 am.

We could not find our cat yesterday evening and thought that she was in the shop and had set the bells ringing so open the connecting door from our house and went into the shop. We were surprised to find 3 men behind the counter removing stock from the tobacco gantery. One of whom out to the customer side of the counter and started to swear at us.

Feeling distictly treatened I grabbed the nearest object to me, a greeting card stand and launched it in the burglars direction. This gave us some space as he moved away from us, but started to throw wine bottles at me from a promotional bin. At which we beat a speedy retreat back to the safety of our home and closed the dividing door.

My wife dialled 999 and I turned on the shop floor lights. Our CCTV footage showed that they made a quick exit at this point. The police were with us while we were still on the 999 call. A response time of 8 minutes, but the thieves were long gone.

While my wife was on the phone and after our son gave the all clear from viewing the monitor of the CCTV he has on his laptop I took a call from the Post Office alarm monitoring station and told them that we had been robbed.

The Police constable was with us until nearly 4 am when a contactor came to board up the shop front door.

More tomorrow.

1.15 am ALARM CALL

We suffered a burglary early today, tobacco.

No trading today.

More details later.

Daily Telegraph: Up In Price Again

The Daily Telegraph increased its cover price by 10p to £1.00 from yesterday after assing 20p to its Saturday price, now £1.80. One of our life time readers of the paper told us yesterday afternoon that altough she enjoyed reading the paper every day she would have to concider how to afford it.

The think that really frustrates her, and she has written to the paper about the issue is the fact that the purchasers of the physical paper subsidise its internet site. She was quite animated about it.

The worry for me is that at £8.70 to have the paper everyday have we reach beyond the limit of what our customers are willing to pay?

I guess we will discover the fallout over the next few weeks.

Calling Time On Underage Sales: Cameron Still Says that Tobacco Retailers Are The Largest Suppileers

This morning I have recieved a reply to my email to Jack Straw. Its from our friend Cameron at the Department of Health. Does this mean legitimate retail can expect no justice on this issue from this Government?

He writes:

Dear Mr Denham,

Thank you for your letter to Jack Straw about youth smoking. As the issues you raise are health related, your letter has been passed to this Department and I have been asked to reply.

As stated in my reply of 2 October (our ref: DE00000447190), tobacco retailers are still the largest source of obtaining cigarettes for young people. You may be interested to know that, since my last letter, the new tobacco consulation has been published and we are consulting on the details of how the proposed powers in the Health Bill might be used. Four sets of proposed regulations were published on 12 October at:

www.dh.gov.uk/en/Consultations/Liveconsultations/DH_106454 

We all agree it is wrong for children to have access to tobacco, whether it is sold or given to them.
we will consider the best approach to tackle the problem of tobacco supply to children in the new tobacco control strategy, whether through legislation and/or through, for example, education and information campaigns.

I hope this reply is helpful.

Yours sincerely,

Cameron Gordon
Customer Service Centre

Hum...

I am sure this table seems to indicate that 44% of children that smoke buy them from shops while 45% buy them from other people and 63% either are given them or take them (should that be steal?).

This is the Department of Health's own research so Cameron should be aware of it.

So in simple terms

44%

is less than

45%

and certainly less than

63%

Londis Celebrate 50 Years

We Need A Business Partner That Understands The Importance Of Customers,

US.

Last Friday Londis celebrated 50 years  as a Symbol Group. In 2007 we were Store of the Year finalists so we celebrated the aniversary in a very positive manner. We launched our new SparPos tills.

After a very uncomfortable 18 months of change at Londis, we have left. Our final delivery was last Monday and we closed our Londis promotional offer down at the end of trading on Thursday evening. The day that Londis retailers across the UK were being asked to mark 50 years of the symbol group we were introducing Spar to our customers.

Capper, the Spar wholesaler and ourselves have not hurries into the new relationship, in fact our first contact was 6 months ago. Though a series of meetings during the summer we have both become comfortable with a future together.

With the support and guidance that the team from Capper have already provided we know that we are with a completely different style of oraganisation. Only in time will it become clear just how good our decision has been.

Calling Time On Underage Sales: Another Reason Why Tobacco Retailers Need National Support

The Stroud News and Journal reports:

'The owners of two Gloucestershire shops have today been fined for selling cigarettes to school children. Gloucestershire County Council Trading Standards Service took action against the owners of the two shops, Sixways Newsagents in Charlton Kings and the Polish Deli in Stroud after they had failed test purchases in February of this year. '

The two owners of Sixways Newsagents were fined were each fined £410 plus a victim surcharge of £15 and costs of £250. The owner of the other shop was fined £168 plus £15 victim surcharge and was ordered to pay £125 towards costs.

Sixways Newsagents had a Challenge 21 policy in place, but still served the 14 year old girl being used by Trading Standards. Clearly having a policy is not enough. Retailers must actively ensure that a Due Diligence process is operating and best practice procedures manage every age restricted product sale.

One has to question how much longer Sixways Newsagents will be selling cigarettes as the Criminal Juctice Act 2008 really has teeth.

Calling Time On Underage Sales: Its The Law For Local Authorities As Well

Not Just Shops

Legitimate retailers are not the only source of supply of cigarettes for children. This Department of Health table of data shows that more children buy cigarettes from Other People, friends and relatives, than from shops. Even more are given them mostly by friends.

And yet it is the bricks and mortar retailers who are the only group targeted by Government and their enforcement agencies. Why is this?

The obvious reason is we visible and at a known address. Shops are the easiest target.

The 1933 Act  states:

Sale of tobacco, &c. to persons under sixteen.


— (1) Any person who sells to a person [ F22 ...] under the age of sixteen years any tobacco or cigarette papers, whether for his own use or not, shall be liable, [ F23  on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding level 4 on the standard scale.]
[F24  (1A) It shall be a defence for a person charged with an offence under subsection (1) above to prove that he took all reasonable precautions and exercised all due diligence to avoid the commission of the offence.]
(2) If on complaint to a court of summary jurisdiction it is proved to the satisfaction of the court that any automatic machine for the sale of tobacco kept on any premises [F25  has been used by any person] under the age of sixteen years, the court [F26  shall] order the owner of the machine, or the person on whose premises the machine is kept, to take such precautions to prevent the machine being so used as may be specified in the order or, if necessary, to remove the machine, within such time as may be specified in the order, and if any person against whom such an order has been made fails to comply therewith, he shall be liable, on summary conviction, [F27  to a fine not exceeding level 4 on the standard scale.]
(3) It shall be the duty of a constable and of a park-keeper being in uniform to seize any tobacco or cigarette papers in the possession of any person apparently under the age of sixteen years whom he finds smoking in any street or public place, and any tobacco or cigarette papers so seized shall be disposed of, if seized by a constable, in such manner as the police authority may direct, and if seized by a park-keeper, in such manner as the authority or person by whom he was appointed may direct.
(4) Nothing in this section shall make it an offence to sell tobacco or cigarette papers to, or shall authorise the seizure of tobacco or cigarette papers in the possession of, any person who is at the time employed by a manufacturer of or dealer in tobacco, either wholesale or retail, for the purposes of his business, or is a boy messenger in uniform in the employment of a messenger company and employed as such at the time.
(5) For the purposes of this section the expression “tobacco” includes cigarettes [F28  any product containing tobacco and intended for oral or nasal use] and smoking mixtures intended as a substitute for tobacco, and the expression “cigarettes” includes cut tobacco rolled up in paper, tobacco leaf, or other material in such form as to be capable of immediate use for smoking.

And the 1991 Act states:

5 Enforcement action by local authorities in England and Wales


(1) It shall be the duty of every local authority to which this section applies—
(a) to consider, at least once in every period of twelve months, the extent to which it is appropriate for them to carry out in their area a programme of enforcement action relating to section 7 of the [1933 c. 12.] Children and Young Persons Act 1933 and sections 3 and 4 above, and
(b) accordingly to carry out in their area any programme which is for the time being considered by them to be appropriate under paragraph (a) above.
(2) In subsection (1)(a) above the reference to a programme of enforcement action relating to the provisions there mentioned is a reference to a programme involving all or any of the following, namely—
(a) the bringing of prosecutions in respect of offences under those provisions;
(b) the investigation of complaints in respect of alleged offences under those provisions;
(c) the taking of other measures intended to reduce the incidence of offences under those provisions;
(d) the making of complaints under section 7(2) of the Act of 1933 and, with a view to determining whether such complaints should be made, the monitoring of the use of such machines for the sale of tobacco as are mentioned in that provision.
(3) This section applies to the following local authorities, namely—
(a) the council of a county, a metropolitan district or a London borough;
(b) the Common Council of the City of London; and
(c) the Council of the Isles of Scilly.

Responsible retailers need to stay in regular contact with local their Trading Standards personnel as well as their local councillors so that they can influence the local authority’s programme of enforcement. With more ‘other people’ selling cigarettes to children than shops local authorities have a duty under the 1991 to take action against this undefined channel.

The 1933 Act indicates ‘Any person who sells to a person [F22. . .] under the age of sixteen years any tobacco or cigarette papers, whether for his own use or not, shall be liable’

Any person who SELLS, it does not restrict the offence to bricks and mortar shops. I think that this is an appropriate time for responsible retailers across the country to ask their local authority what actions they are undertaking to bring these other sources of cigarettes within the law.

I have already asked my West Sussex County Council, is anyone else up for it?

This Is Getting Interesting

Steve is here this evening installing the tills for our new EPoS system. He installed the back office kit last week and the support team of Rod, Maria and Chris have been building our stock file and printing labels all week.

We had till training today and we go live at 7 am tomorrow morning. Taking a look around the store this evening most of the products have a Spar shelf edge labels with only a few areas to complete tomorrow.

A team of Spar merchandicers have been busying themselves around the shop making sufficient changes to show that we are going to be a different offer. They are bacvk again Friday and Monday to do more.

Our second Spar delivery from Capper will arrive tomorrow and we have placed the ambient part of our order for Monday's delivery this afternoon. The hand held scanner that we built the order on is going to be very helpful with the management of the shop.

This is the fourth extra long day in a row so hopefully we will beable to close up and be finished at a reasonable time tomorrow. Although I have to say the Capper rep Steve and his boss, Stuart have do a great support job this week.

WE look forwad to some serious support from Capper over the next few months as we develop our offer along the Spar model.

Calling Time On Underage Sales: Failure In Bristol

Its Not Easy, But It Is Possible

Last month Trading Standards in Bristol executed Operation Reality Check. They undertook a test purchase exercise on 20 shops with 2 girls and this report on This Is Somerset says:

'An undercover operation caught shopkeepers in Bristol who are selling cigarettes to youngsters. Of the 20 shops visited in Bristol, 14 of them sold cigarettes to underage volunteers without checking their age. They are now being investigated by trading standards officers and face prosecution.'

A 70% failure rate. Yes it is easy to say the Trading Standards pick store that are more likely to fail on these tests, but it is clear that too many shops don't use best practice when selling age restricted products.

As Bristol is home to Imperial Tobacco's head office I have sent this email to Steve Stotesbury


Dear Mr Stotesbury

I am sure that you are aware of the recent test purchases exercise undertaken by Bristol Trading Standards. Operation Reality Check tested 20 retailers and found 14 whose shop sold cigarettes to children. No doubt you would agree is a shocking failure rate in the city that your company has its head office.

You will recall my pervious emails proposing improvements to the No ID No Sale programme. Over the past 15 weeks I have been in contact with a good number of people about ‘Calling Time On Underage Sales’ and have developed my ideas further.

The Children and Young Persons (Protection from Tobacco) Act 1991 placed the burden of ensuring children do not have access from the legitimate trade entirely on the shoulders of store owners and their staff. As with almost all Government regulation and legislation there was no initial guidance as to how legal sales should be managed.

There is still no national support system for tobacco retailers and that is what I am asking should be developed.

I my previous email I suggested that No ID No Sale should have:

1 An example best practice store management policy.
2 An example best practice store management process.
3 A step by step Due Diligence procedure.
4 A standard national staff training programme with test and certification process.
5 A ‘safety net’ to catch new entrants to the trade so that their suppliers will help them meet the standards required to operate within the law.

added to its current offer. I am now in a position to paint the whole package that I believe would give retailers a much greater level of support in the crucial area.

The No ID No Sale campaign customer facing display material that hits the customer as they enter the shop and at the counter whether they are buying an age restricted product or not. Already in place.

The CitizenCard proof of age card scheme for people that do not have an acceptable alternative. Already in place.

My suggested five steps as above, needs to be fully developed.

A database of store owner/manage email addresses so that they can be easily reminded of key due diligence checks on a regular basis by the programme.

A database of employees who have been awarded the national certificate so that they can be sent email reminders of how to sell age restricted products.

Due diligence reminder messages to appear on retailer facing cigarette wrapping on a periodic basis.

An 18 age restricted symbol to appear on packs.

As has been demonstrated by the Bristol’s Operation Reality Check retailers all to easily fail to do the simple things that matter when selling cigarettes like ask for proof of age. Too many customer facing employees fail to ask to see evidence.

So does this sound a sensible approach to bring about within the next window of opportunity that Mike Penning MP offered during Monday’s debate?

Moving To Spar

Not much time to blog this week as we are changing supply and symbol group.

First order arrived this morning along with a merchendicing team.

We have a new epos system being brought up to working speed and will go live on Friday.

Second order to place this afternoon along with deciding on what to promote.

New facsia being fitted on Friday and much else to do.

I will report more later.

No, It Will Not!

A look through the  Department of Health's 'Consultation on proposed tobacco control regulations for England (under the Health Bill 2009)' reveals that:

'The proposed regulations that accompany this Impact Assessment permit a temporary display that is limited to 1,500 sq cm. This means that retailers can show a small amount of display when they are serving a customer. In practice, retailers would be able to keep their existing tobacco shelving and use simple, low-cost covers, avoiding the need for under the counter or overhead solutions.'

Our gantry is 1.2 metres or 1200cm, the 1500 square centimetres that this regulation proposes will give a allowed window of visability of just 12 cm. This means that my nil cost option is a none runner.

Will This Be Acceptable?

Best Sellers At The Bottom

Some months ago I tested a nil cost method  of possibly meeting the display ban and ask will it be acceptable?

I guess that I will have to wait to see the document that was not available for MPs yesterday to find out!

95/95; Calling Time On Underage Sales, DECISION DAY

MP Mike, How Will He Vote Today?

Today the Health Bill 2009 returns to the House of Commons for its Report Stage and Third Reading. The issue of the proposed Tobacco Display Ban is gaining media interest, but alas, I fear that political dogma will rule the day and most if not all Labour MPs will vote with the proposal.

Of course when the TAX EXCELORATOR on cigarettes was introduced by John Major's Government and continued by Gordon Brown there were and remain unintended or I suspect foreseen consequences. People went across the channel, bought tobacco and cigarettes at a lower tax, brought them back and sold them in the pubs, on the street, at car boot sales and other places.

This has been followed by counterfeit cigarettes being brought on to the UK illicit market with not control over how they are made or who they are sold to. Certainly this is one of those unintended consequences.

So what will be the consequences of a yes vote today? Here are just a few:

Some independent newsagents and convenience store will be forced to close over the next decade, but probably not before October One 2013.

The Display Ban will make cigarettes and tobacco appear to be illicit products and blur the divide between the legal retail channel and the Other People.

It will make it much more difficult for Trading Standards across England to identify where children are obtaining their supplies of cigarettes.

What it will not do is stop children start smoking. It is rare for children to buy their first cigarette from a shop.

It will also not specifically lead to an improvement in retailer compliance to the 1991 Act.

PS The NFRN are claiming that their entire membership will not vote Labour at the next General Election. That should get the Government worried. I think the one thing that the NFRN can claim is that the effects of this Bill will long out live this Government. Lets hope that the next administration will understand us better.

93/95: Calling Time On Underage Sales, NFRN Place AD In Times

Trying To Sway The MPs

The National Federation of Retail Newsagents has expended a great deal of energy and time on campaigning against the proposed Tobacco Display Ban. This advert in yesterday's Times is the last throw of the dice as they attempt to persuade Members of Parliament to vote Clause 21 of the Health Bill 2009 down on Monday.

It certainly shows that the NFRN is not giving up without trying everything that they can at a national level. I just wonder how many of the 17,000 plus members have made an impact on their own MP. I know that Nick Herbert, the MP for Arundel and the South Downs understands how I feel about the Governments Tobacco Control policy.

Two days to go before the nation’s elected representatives vote on this Bill. By Tuesday next week we will know if open displays are to be banished, but it will not be until later in the year that the Department of Health will reveal what their next step in the Tobacco Control agenda is.

For me, display or no display, there will be shops that will fail the test and will still not have an effective management system in place to stop underage sales. Since 1992 when the Children and Young Persons (Protection from Tobacco) Act 1991 came into force it has been tobacco retailers that have been on the front line.

Now is the time that manufacturers and the supply chain became part of the due diligence process for every store giving each and every retailer the extra level of support to help bring child access to cigarettes through bricks and mortar store to an end.

A New Website For Community Retailers

A new website, Better Retailing was launched yesterday. Its on http://www.betterretailing.com/ and is aimed at the independent newsagent and convenience store channel. The site is published by Newtrade the company that produces Retail Newsagent and they say about the site:

'Better Retailing aims to support enterprising independent retailers with a site full of ideas and business opportunities from each other and selected trade partners.'

I am pleased to say that I have been invited to be one of their regular contributors and will be posting items on magazines, store development, local marketing and the use of sales data to inform his range and display. I will also take a keen interest in the impact of government and legislation on my business.

To start with there are three other contributors to the site, Nick Shanagher, Louise Banham and Stefan Appleby who all work at Newtrade Publishing. As the retailer on the project I am excited to be part this innovative site and I am sure that the Better Retailing will grow into a very useful resource for the sector.

90/95; Calling Time On Under Age Sales, So How Will The Voting Work Out Next Week?

633 MPs Will Vote On Our Future Next Monday

Austin, John , Borrow, David S, Caton, Martin, Challen, Colin, Connarty, Michael, Cook, Frank, Cunningham, Jim, Dismore, Andrew, Dobbin, Jim, Dowd, Jim, Drew, David, Etherington, Bill, Flynn, Paul, Godsiff, Roger, Havard, Dai, Hopkins, Kelvin, Hoyle, Lindsay, Iddon, Brian, Jenkins, Brian, Jones, Lynne, Lepper, David, Marshall-Andrews, Robert, McCartney, Ian, McDonnell, John, Morgan, Julie, Mullin, Chris, Murphy, Denis, Naysmith, Doug, Olner, Bill, Prentice, Gordon, Prosser, Gwyn, Riordan, Linda, Robinson, Geoffrey, Simpson, Alan, Taylor, David, Truswell, Paul, Turner, Desmond, Vis, Rudi, Walley, Joan, Williams, Betty, Wood, Mike, These are the 41 members of the Parliamentary Labour Party who have signed up to Early Day Motion 1424.

The motion says:

That this House notes that newsagents across the country, as represented by the National Federation of Retail Newsagents and the Association of News Retailers, have expressed serious concern about the recent consolidation of the newspaper and magazine distribution market and the likely emergence of two regional monopolies; values the important role of independent newsagents and is concerned that these changes in the market may force many to close, restricting consumer choice and harming local communities, as well as causing up to 2,800 job losses in news distribution branches across the UK; and calls on the Secretary of State for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform to request that the Office of Fair Trading looks urgently at these recent developments in the distribution market and takes action to safeguard competition for the benefit of consumers, independent newsagents and distribution employees alike.

A large number of newsagents sell cigarettes and will be affected by the Health Bill 2009’s clause 21  that proposes to ban the display of tobacco. If these 41 MPs vote for newsagents and against this clause it will be defeated.

But of course thirty of them have also signed EDM 189.

So the numbers, Labour have 349 MPs, the number required for a majority is 317 out of the total voting members. If all 41 Labour MPs who signed up to EDM 1424 vote against Clause 21 and all the opposition MPs do likewise the clause would be defeated.

If the 30 Labour MPs who signed both EDM’s vote for the Government then the Clause will be passed and the Department of Health will carry on and produce the new regulation that will let us know which of the Display Ban options they will opt for.

The next big question is what will happen after the next year’s General Election?

88/95: Calling Time On Underage Sales, My reply to The Minister (Not For Much Longer I Hope)

Last week I received this email in reply to my request for information  on secondary age children's sources of supply. To say that I was angered by the Department of Health's miss information is an understatement. The use of the 2006 survey result that conveniently showed the 78% of the responding children sourced the cigarettes from shops when the 2008 research indicated that the figure was reduced to 44%  is demeaning both of their credibility & proffesionalism and my integrity as a citizen.

This is my next email to Gillian Merron:  I have also sent it to my MP.

Dear Minister,

Clearly from your Department's latest reply you are more interested in the Health Bill 2008 and getting the Tobacco Display Ban passed in the House of Commons next week than replying to the points I asked in my recent email.

Please would you and your Department team show me some respect. I am a citizen of the United Kingdom, a tax payer, a voter, a tax collector, an employer, a supporter of my local community, an effective parent and much else. In fact I believe that I am an effective member of our society.

Yes my shop does sell cigarettes, our takings on tobacco as a category is less than £1400 per week which means that tobacco is not a significant part of our business. We stock cigarettes because there are a number of our customers who wish to use us as a 'safe' source of supply. They do not want to risk imported or other dubious suppliers.

We use an effect system of underage sale prevention and next week following a significant investment in a new till system will be moving our challenge age to 25 years and start to record the proof of age evidence that customer offer on the till. A great leap forward from our current ability to only show an alert when an age restricted product is scanned.

What I asked in my previous email to you concerned the data in the Smoking Drinking and Drug Use Among Young People 2008. In particular the smoking children’s sources of supply, your Department’s own data suggests that children use several different places to obtain cigarettes.

From your data the average responding child uses 2.4 different sources and I asked if you have any data that indicates which sources are more important. Are newsagents used more than friends or is it the other way around.

Making assumptions from an incomplete data set about how badly legitimate retailers perform is not reasonable. Responding on data collected in 2006 when the research from 2008 has clearly superseded it is insulting.

So are you able you tell me how often children use each of their sources of supply?

I have also sent it to my MP.

87/95: Calling Time On Underage Sales, A Lesson From Mahendra

This is Mahendra's illustration on the finanicial ups and downs of sell tobacco.

A Shop has Weekly Takings of

£10.000

*

1/3 of Total would be £3333.33 Gross Taking 

On Tobacco

*

Average Mark up of 5%

will give us £167 Gross Profit

6 % will give us £ 200

7% will give us £233

8% will give us £267

9% will give us £300

Expenses

£8.33…. Bank Charges @ 25p per £100.00

£161.00 one person wages

(12 hrs x 7days=84 hrs of 1/3 =28hrsx£5.75=£161.00)

£64.10 Rent and Rates

(average 8k rent+2k rates)

£7.69 Shop insurance

(£1200.00 total insurance)

£10.00 minimum expenses for water/ electricity

Total expenses

 £251.00

Up to 7.5% on tobacco I do not make any

profit in current situation.

Changes A Foot

Not This One

Not much time to post anything this week as we are preparing to move Symbol Group next week.  More to follow.

Vintage Forecast

Plenty Of Sunshine

Its harvest time at our two local vineyards and conversations we had yesterday with people from from them suggests that 2009 is going to be a good year. Nyetimber and Nutbourne both report that the last six weeks of sunshine with little rain has made this years crop outstanding.

We certainly look forward to getting the vintage in stock, but for Nyetimber that will probably be in 2015 as this year they have released the 2003 and that was our last really long hot summer.

83/95: Calling Time On Underage Sales, Response From The DofH

Thank you for your further letter to Gillian Merron about youth smoking.


I have been asked to reply.

Tobacco retailers are still the largest source of obtaining cigarettes for young people. Statistics from the Government’s Consultation on the future of tobacco control showed that, in 2006, 78 per cent of children between 11 and 15 years obtained their cigarettes from shops. This information can be found at: http://www.dh.gov.uk/  (type ‘Consultation on the future of tobacco control’ into the search bar and click on the second link. The statistics can be found on page 37).

The consultation closed on 8 September 2008, having received almost 100,000 responses.

The consultation focused on four main areas:

Reducing smoking rates and health inequalities caused by smoking;

Protecting children and young people from smoking;

Supporting smokers to quit; and

Helping those who find it difficult to quit.

It also included possible further regulation of the display of tobacco at the point of sale, access to tobacco from vending machines, and tobacco packaging.

On 9 December 2008 a report summarising responses to the consultation was published on the Department of Health website at www.dh.gov.uk/tobacco. The Secretary of State also made a written Ministerial Statement to the House of Commons outlining proposed tobacco legislation to be taken forward in the next Parliamentary session. This is available at www.parliament.uk, by following the links to Written Ministerial Statements on 9 December.

The Health Bill, introduced to Parliament on 15 January 2009, seeks to remove display of tobacco products at the point of sale, which will help to protect children and young people from the marketing of tobacco products and the harm caused by smoking. It also contains powers to restrict the sale of cigarettes from vending machines, which are one of the most common and easily accessible sources of cigarettes for young people.

Vending machines are used by children because they are self-service, so often there is no opportunity for anyone to check their age. Regulations under the Health Bill will ensure there is contact between the customer and a member of staff, effectively banning self-service.

Should underage sales remain a problem after two years of regulation we will move to ban vending machines altogether. Further consultations on the details of regulations relating to vending machines will be forthcoming later this year.

Whilst we have had some significant successes in recent years in reducing the prevalence of smoking and the numbers of deaths from smoking related diseases, there is still no room for complacency. With over 80,000 deaths a year in England, smoking remains the biggest single cause of preventable deaths and the biggest single cause of health inequalities.

That is why it is important that we take forward legislation to protect children and young people and to support those who want to quit. We are committed to publishing a new tobacco control strategy by the end of the year outlining future actions to be taken in tobacco control.

You also mention adults proxy-purchasing tobacco products for young people.

We all agree it is wrong for children to have access to tobacco, whether it is sold or given to them.
However, a proxy-purchasing offence would not address the broader issue of supply of tobacco to children. It would only cover a small number of cases where the individual, when they bought tobacco, intended to supply it to a child. Cases where friends or family share cigarettes with a child would not count and we know that family and friends are the usual source of tobacco for about a third of children.
We are not aware of any country where there is a specific offence for proxy-purchasing of tobacco. However, some countries have a sale/supply law whereby giving tobacco to a child, whether selling it to them, buying it for them, or otherwise providing it, is an offence. We are currently looking to the experience of other countries with a sale/supply law in place to establish whether there is any evidence to demonstrate that legislation would be the most effective method to take in tackling children's access to tobacco.

We will consider the best approach to tackle the problem of tobacco supply to children in the new tobacco control strategy, whether through legislation and/or through, for example, education and information campaigns.

I hope this reply is helpful.

Yours sincerely,

Cameron Gordon
Customer Service Centre

There are various points that Mr Gordon makes that do not reflect the latest Smoking Drinking and Drug Use among Young Peoples survey. I will concider further questions to ask over the next few days.