NEWS SPECIAL
COVID-19 UPDATE FOR ALL THE LATEST CORONAVIRUS NEWS, HEAD TO WWW.SLRMAG.CO.UK/CATEGORY/NEWS/
app Ubamarket has found
FOOD-TO-GO ‘TO DECLINE BY £6BN’ THIS YEAR
that safety is a key driver for
NEW RESEARCH SUGGESTS THE FOOD-TO-GO MARKET WILL TAKE A
shoppers today with 50% of
BEATING THIS YEAR, BUT WILL RECOVER BY 2022.
SAFETY FIRST New research from retail
Brits not having used cash at all since the start of lockdown and have relied exclusively on card and contactless payments. Additionally, 43% want their shopping experience to require as little human interaction as possible.
VAT CHALLENGE Businesses that deferred paying their VAT bills should be allowed to spread their repayments into the middle of next year, says tax adviser Blick Rothenberg. HMRC are now reminding businesses that repayments must be made by
The UK food-to-go market is set to decline by £6bn in 2020 because of the coronavirus pandemic, according to the new Lumina Intelligence UK Food-to-go Market Report 2020 Update. However, the report forecasts that turnover of the food-to-go market will recover to close to its 2019 level by the end of 2022. The UK food-to-go market experienced a decade of growth
through the 2010s with Lumina Intelligence valuing the market at £21.3bn in 2019, a growth of +2.4%. However, the catastrophic impact of the coronavirus pandemic is set to wipe £6bn off the market value in 2020. This equates to a decline of 29%, taking the market value to £15bn. The average number of food-togo visits per consumer per month has dropped 25% year-on-year with lunch the most impacted daypart with a fall in frequency of 37%. Despite a significant reduction in value this year, the food-to-go market is set to recover quickly due to its versatility, low contact and value-led proposition.
31 March, even if firms can’t trade their way out of their current financial predicament.
MOBILITY MAX Data from the week ending 13 Sep by CACI has found that mobility across the UK reached 82% of pre-Covid levels, the highest since lockdown began. The peak coincided with the return to schools and a wider return to offices, although new restrictions this week are likely to stymie any further growth.
FURLOUGH EXTENSION ‘COULD SAVE THOUSANDS OF JOBS’ The Scottish Government has said extending the furlough scheme by eight months could save 61,000 jobs north of the border. A government report put the direct cost of extending the furlough scheme in Scotland to June at around £850m – and wider economic benefits, such as increasing GDP, mean that it could pay for itself.
8 I SLRMAG.CO.UK / ISSUE 23 / WEDNESDAY 23RD SEPTEMBER 2020
Scotland’s Economy Secretary Fiona Hyslop (pictured) commented: “The UK Government must think again about withdrawing blanket support and they must urgently implement some form of extension which would continue to provide help for the sectors that have been most heavily affected.”
