Retail Randoms

NATIONAL FLOCKDOWNOWN

If you’re wandering the supermarket aisles wondering if free range eggs have become the latest product to fall victim to the supply chain crisis, then don’t worry, they haven’t.

Worry instead about Britain’sbiggest-ever outbreak of bird flu,which has led to nation’s hens literallygetting cooped-up to preventthe disease spreading.

Back in 2008, a bird flu outbreak killed 243 people, mostly in Asia, and a House of Lords report warned that up to 75,000 Britons could die as the result of a global pandemic leading to “massive disruption” and caused by a flu virus jumping from animals to people. Yeah right, as if that could ever happen.

So, because of the current outbreak, free range eggs have been temporarily reclassified as barn eggs until hens are allowed back outside.

And it’s not just poultry that's affected by the so-called ‘flockdown’. The UK-wide Avian Influenza Prevention Zone makes it a legal requirement for all bird keepers – not just farmers – to keep them indoors and follow strict biosecurity measures.

Which explains why you haven’t seen many people taking their budgie for a walk recently.

RUSSIAN ROULETTE

There was a time when some vodka brands couldn’t shout loud enough about how Russian they were.

Given that brands are now retreating from Moscow faster than Napoleon in 1812, it’s hard to believe Russian Standard once sued “the mother of all vodkas from the motherland of vodka” Stolichnaya for false advertising over its provenance. At the time, Stolichnaya said it was truly Russian, was made in Russia, and was made from Russian ingredients.

What a difference a “special military operation” makes. Now Stolichnaya (produced in Latvia these days) has rebranded as the less Russian-sounding Stoli and its website is decked out in blue and yellow in an act of solidarity with Ukraine.

Don’t expect to see Russian Standard, which is more Russian than a bear in a Cossack hat, following suit. Its homepage could easily be mistaken for the Russian Tourist Board’s.

However, the company will probably ride out all the sanctions and boycotts, like the one imposed by the Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board.

When the board blocked the sale of Russian spirits across the state, the only brands affected were Russian Standard and Ustianochka.

Never heard of Ustianochka? That’s because its exclusively sold in Pennsylvania.

So, spare a thought for Pennsylvanian resident Margaret Bayuk, a 74-year-old Slovakian immigrant and sole proprietor of Ustianochka. She’s been left with 30,000 bottles of vodka she can’t offload. And the mother of all headaches.