Business Extra

Gregg sales GREGGS announced that sales have increased by 17 per cent over the last year, saying its products remained “compelling” to customers in the cost-of-living crisis.  The bakery chain, which first opened in Newcastle in 1951, opened 63 new shops this year and extended some opening hours.

Defence gambit AEROSPACE, defence and security company, Escribano Mechanical & Engineering, acquired 3 per cent of Indra, Spain’s leading IT and defence systems multinational.  The €65 million transaction makes Escribano’s Indra’s second industrial partner and strengthens its presence in the Defence sector. 

Winter duels STRIKES wiped out more than 2.8million working days in the UK during the “winter of discontent”, with 566 lost in March alone, official figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) revealed.  Industrial action between October 2022 and the end of March was the worst since 1989, the ONS said.

Main concern DESPITE the cost of living crisis, 30 per cent of Spanish consumers are more concerned about sustainability than price, EY consultants found.  The tendency to take environmental factors into consideration before looking at price tags was usually generational, and more common amongst the young, researchers said.  

Helping hand FAMILY members spent £38 billion (€43.76 billion) on assisting relatives over the last five years, according to a survey by insurance firm SunLife. The most common reason amongst the over-50s was helping their children to buy a house, with 26 per cent contributing an average of £26,680 (€30,730).

All change British American Tobacco’s finance director Tadeu Marroco took over immediately after the announcement of his appointment as new chief executive. Marroco, who has worked for the tobacco giant since 1992, replaces boss Jack Bowles, who stepped down after four years as CEO and 20 with the company. 

Cloud cover CAIXABANK and Google Cloud signed an agreement to speed up the Catalan bank’s digital transformation.  Under the deal the bank will use the cloud to boost data analysis technologies in the coming years while creating new products and services by personalising its commercial offer.

Worse off BRITONS’ overall wealth fell to a 10-year low after as a third had to dip into their savings over the last year, taking out an average of £3,500 (€4,033).  More than half told LifeSearch insurance firm’s Health, Wealth and Happiness 2023 Index that they were worse off financially than last year. 

Cheap labour WOMEN residents who were born outside Spain account for 6 per cent of the population but occupy 160,000 – 44 per cent – of the 368,000 new jobs that were created over the last year.  They earn an average €11,800 pre-tax, lower than the minimum wage and less than half the national average. 

Courses needed OVERHAULING apprenticeships would help to kickstart the economy, Tesco chief Ken Murphy said.  Despite a huge increase in the number of courses equivalent to a Bachelor’s or Master’s degree between 2014 and 2022, courses equivalent to GCSEs had plummeted by 70 per cent, Murphy pointed out.