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This week in FMCG

It’s been another busy week in FMCG. Read on to find out what happened this week.

Supermarkets supported bushfire victims

Supermarket giants Woolworths, Coles and Aldi are helping communities devastated by Australia’s ongoing bushfire crisis. Woolies is donating half a million dollars to the S.T.A.N.D (Support Through Australian Natural Disasters) program to support The Salvation Army. They are hoping to raise A$3 million in total. While Coles is donating over A$4,000 worth of products and Aldi has donated food and other items to local charities.

Wage thieves face parliamentary inquiry

Wage theft scandals in the retail and hospitality sectors will come under scrutiny as part of a parliamentary inquiry. Labor senators referred the underpayments to the upper house’s economics committee which will investigate the unlawful underpayment of workers. Woolworths, Bunnings Warehouse, Super Retail Group, Dominos, Michael Hill, and MJ Bale all admitted to underpaying workers in the last year.

Caltex and Woolworths launched fresh convenience offer

Petrol giant Caltex and supermarket Woolworths opened a co-created store to deliver fresh convenience products at the service station. The 24-hour Caltex Woolworths Metro in North Ryde, NSW, offers grab-and-go meal options including sandwiches, hot food, barista made coffee and fresh fruit and veg as well as Woolworths own brand range. The companies will open two more stores in Kingsford, NSW, later this November and another store in Melbourne in 2020.

Coles and Sainsbury’s partnered on private label range

Supermarket Coles and British supermarket Sainsbury’s signed a three-year deal to expand Coles’ private label range. The retailer added 1200 products to its own brand range last year and sales grew at twice the rate of any other products. Michael Luck, director of business development at Sainsbury’s said that the deal will bring more choice and innovation to Australian customers.

Australian brands a hit at Alibaba’s 11.11 festival

Australian brands Swisse, A2 and Blackmores were among the most popular in this year’s Alibaba 11.11 Global Shopping Festival. This year generated RMB 268.4 billion (US$38.4 billion). The e-commerce giant broke $US1 billion turnover in the first minute, with orders peaking at 544,000 per second.

That’s it for this week. We’ll be back on Monday morning!

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