Not a Strait-foward solution

28:41You can see it with various parts of the domestic consumer market is very weak. So, you know, the UK as a proxy relative to, let's say, the US has actually struggled with this transition. But, you know, from the part that I look at directly, the stock market, I would say that the composition of the markets has been one of the biggest challenges. Just not having access or exposures to some of the faster-growing parts of the world or faster-growing parts of the equity market has been a difficulty that the UK has faced. And Peter, economics professor and advisor over in the United States. Peter, are people in America aware, starting to think that the US is losing some of its traditional allies or that strength that it might have had with the UK and Europe over recent decades is not going to be how it will be in the future?

29:30Yeah, I know. I think that's right. I think, you know, I do hear a lot about the fact that, you know, we're losing a lot of our really, really good friends who we've been dealing with for a long time. And, you know, putting tariffs on friends of ours, you know, there's nothing better in the world than free trade. It gets countries together, you know, and it's so disruptive with these tariffs. I mean, you look at companies and, you know, your other speakers, you know, can attest to this, you know, like some companies, you know, were producing in China, you put a lot of tariffs on China and then they build new facilities in Malaysia.

30:05That's super costly. It makes costs go up a lot, you know, and it's very, very disruptive. And, you know, So those kind of things make costs more expensive, harder to do supply chain analysis. So I think that there's no economist in the world that would say that tariffs are actually a good thing. And I think people have to understand this. Peter, thank you for your time this morning. Enjoy those rocket launches in your local community where SpaceX takes off from, we're all following closely, the big Artemis II launch from Cape Canaveral that's happened overnight. They're on their way for their trip around the moon.

30:45Simon, thanks as well. Simon Kenny, chief executive of Goodfellow, the advanced materials manufacturer. More to come from Anita and Obi and yourselves as well. 85058. Do let us know your thoughts. Gavin's just been into it saying the Tesco trade analogy, not a good one. The fact there are now a handful of supermarkets that hold a monopoly is all the smaller stores went out of business because the bigger ones, hoovered up all the money now, change out supermarkets for countries. Very interesting, Gavin. Thank you. Keep your thoughts coming. Wake Up To Money with Sean Farrington. Good morning. It is Wake Up To Money on BBC Five Live on this Thursday morning, the 2nd of April.

31:26If you're looking for the very latest on Artemis 2, you might have heard at the top of the show that the launch was successful. The astronauts are safe and on their way for their trip around the moon. We heard about a few issues earlier with the toilet. Anita Frost with us this morning from Green Beach Studios, particularly fascinated by this. Anita, just in the last few minutes, it appears after the problems that were reported earlier, the toilet is ready for use. Hooray. Mission Control. Imagine having this job. Mission Control says, Happy to report the toilet is go for use. We do recommend letting the system get to operating speed before donating fluid.

32:07Awesome. The phrase is used. So that's amazing. We'll keep you posted. Stay with us on 5 Live throughout the morning as we keep you updated with that. We're going to try and get you to bed a little bit early, mission control tells the astronauts as well. I don't know how you sleep with the excitement or something like that, but they are obviously well drilled on it. Anita, we've been chatting about how the economy's getting on and how various parts of it are feeling, households and consumers being hit and the like. We've seen that Andrew Bailey, we heard Obi mention a bit earlier that the governor of the Bank of England concerned about growth prospects here in the UK.

32:44And we might get into what that might mean for interest rates. But I just detected from what you were saying with your Green Bean Studios business, the way maybe the launch in America, not perhaps as getting over there because of everything going on, maybe not quite as you planned, prices going up as well. We've heard a lot of your story speaking to you regularly on Wake Up To Money. And, you know, we do get close to the businesses that we check in with regularly. Does this feel like a particularly tougher time? Because you're always beaming with optimism. But within that, is this a hard time for the business?

33:17Yeah, absolutely. So from an investment point of view, we're now nearly two years where we haven't seen any new investment come into the business. What are those challenges? Well, actually, it's actually taking risk. So in the UK, we're not seeing the risk for our industry and the appetite to invest. Unfortunately, I'm a female founder. I'm a female founder of colour. Can't say I've always had challenges in that space, but it has come up against us being able to get that fair playing field as they operate in. How does that sort of portray itself? How do you feel that experience? Yeah, I just feel it's a real, you know, it does two things.

33:58It fuels me to carry on because ultimately we're making impact. And now I'm going into those investment spaces and I'm saying, look, I want somebody who wants to invest in social impact and profitability at the same time. They go both hand in hand for us because the world of where our children are right now, it's very uncertain. There's so many things happening around technology, around education. our little ones are not getting exactly what they need and we're committed to doing that and not only committed we are proving that our children love the green bean books it gives them fun it gives them learning it gives them an opportunity to be a child and then the toys just follow on from that so then when you go into the investment space you're like hey hey guys and you're two years in and no one's got the appetite for that there's some sort of disconnect in there but the The thing that's been a win for us, Sean, in this first quarter is our ecosystem and it is the PR.

34:57So we're finding we've got new partners. We partnered with the National Literacy Trust for World Book Day. Wigan Council commissioned us and invested because they're releasing investment into those hard to reach spaces, the children that really need it. So that's encouraging. But still my ask to investors is, you know, get in contact with us. Where are those social impact profitability investors who want to do great for our next generation, who are going to come through the pipeline? And it's not going to be good on job creation if we continue to ignore that space. Obi, Obi Adjokami, who's with us this morning, is Global Equities Fund Manager at Carmignac.

35:38Is that something you see? Do you see those trends come and go about the phrase Anita used? Is it social impact, sustainable investment? Do in times that we're in, does that go further down the priority list for investors? I mean, I'm not sure if it goes down the priority list, but I think, you know, in the world of investments and stock markets, you know, we're trying to compete with some of the best companies in the world in terms of trying to generate returns. And so, you know, money typically follows profitability or typically follows returns. And so that's one of the key things that will drive where the money will go.

36:18But I think, you know, to Anita's point, one of the challenges is getting access to capital. And we need businesses that are profitable or as profitable as possible because they are the ones that will be investing and making the sort of the big R &D decisions that we'll see grow from the future. I mean, that's a typical stock that we will try and invest in. And we want companies that generate significant profits so that they can reinvest in the business. And I think if there's a theme that's where the UK struggles somewhat is if we don't have enough of those companies that are making those reinvestments, we don't get the hiring.

36:54We don't get the growth. And so the more support that we can get from a domestic perspective for those type of companies, the better. But just on your point again on the sort of social side, I think it's all about profits and returns. If these companies can show and demonstrate that they can make profits above or returns above the broader stock market, then actually capital typically follows. Changing tack now, 85058, if you want to join in our chat about subscriptions. Anita, I don't know if you've done your homework beforehand. Have you checked in on those direct debits? Are you a subscription fiend at all or are you good at being on top of these things?

37:34So at Green Bean Studios, we have a lot from creative suites. We use a lot of subscriptions to do our creative work, design work. Within the business. Within the business, yeah. Personally, I'm not a subscriber. I've got lots of friends that subscribe to the world's best coffee and then they're like, it wasn't the world's best coffee and they're kind of trapped in it. And yeah, I've got a teenager who gets into the subscriptions, but from an ad-free perspective, which I think is quite good because he wants no distractions. So there's lots, right? Oh, is that the pitch to parents? Are we giving kids a hint there?

38:05If you want to get a subscription, say, look, I want to go ad free. Few distractions for me. Then, Obi, for you, are you a free trial? I've forgotten to cancel the free trial and now I'm paying for something. Yeah, I'm not actually. I'm pretty good with it. But one of the things I was, I'm surprised because, you know, I've always loved the subscription model. It's just that way of managing costs a bit better rather than paying big lump sums for a whole year. You can spit costs over the year. And, you know, I think the technology generally has advanced to a certain point now that most decent companies allow you to cancel and resubscribe quite easily.

38:42Yeah, it's big words and big numbers from the government. £170 they reckon that could be saved for a household from protecting customers from what they call subscription traps. So from spring next year, gives companies a year to get their head around this. Customers can expect to find it easier to cancel their subscriptions, get reminders before those free trials end as well. I do like to get involved in a free trial, and I always cancel within the minutes of signing up to it whatever's needed if I want to protect myself. but it does mean if you do that, there's just the one you forget, you get distracted by, and then before you know it, you've paid a month that you didn't want to.

39:22Before we find out what it means for subscription-based businesses, Wake Up To Me and He's Megan Ballantyne went out to find out how people manage their subscriptions. I downloaded two apps to see what they were about, and the next thing I knew was subscriptions had been taken from a bank account. You'd never set a reminder, you always forget, and then it's like,£10 left your account, you're like, OK. I don't do free trials. I just do the subscriptions I want. I don't do free trials and then forget. I wouldn't do that sort of stuff. I'd just buy Netflix. If I want Netflix, I'll buy Netflix. But I won't do a free trial and then you have to cancel or pay later on.

39:58I wouldn't bother. I have a spreadsheet of things that come out of my bank. A spreadsheet. That's impressive. Right, we've got Emma Thackery with us, who's co-founder of Hip Hop, that makes functional soft drinks. I like that description. Emma, good morning to you. Good to talk to you again. Good morning, Sean. So you have subscriptions as part of your business, Emma. Do you see people coming to you very often saying, I forgot to cancel and I've been paying when I didn't intend to? Very occasionally. However, I mean, what I would say about hip hop is that we're probably already very aligned with the spirit of the new legislation.

40:36So, for example, it's very easy for people to cancel the subscriptions online via our website. We send reminders to people in advance of the payment coming out of their account. We've got a real-life person on the end of the phone if there are any problems. But, yeah, occasionally it does happen. People are forgetful. What do you think will be the consequences of a change in the rules of something like this? I think that if you are a business with good practice and you've got the consumer at the heart of what you're doing, then probably many businesses are already in line with a lot of the requirements.

41:19I think where I can foresee some issues is, well, for one, the compliance burden doesn't fall equally on business. So for an SME like us with maybe only one or two people running e-commerce, it's a bigger set of steps to go through or more work than perhaps a larger organisation. um regulations for e-commerce are already complex now i mean it's vital that they are because they've got to protect people's data but they're complex nonetheless um i would say also that for a business like hip-hop it's a little bit different to a software subscription or a gym subscription because we're sending drinks products out and they're perishable so they can't be returned They can't be put back into stock.

42:08Our understanding from looking at the new rules is that there's a new 14-day cancellation period or it's been strengthened at least, a 14-day window before auto-renewal. So that's going to require very, very clear communications with customers, very precise changes to workflows in our systems. You know, the compliance process has got to be absolutely bang on. Would you have to make sure you're not sending something out in that 14-day period that you're going to have to give a refund for a few days later? So we will need to follow the rules to the T, make sure we send out a notice at the start of the 14-day period, ensure that we've communicated properly.

42:54now as a food and drink business because it's perishable if we've given people enough notice and followed all the steps then then the the sort of protection around refunds applies however it's just making sure that we do every single step correctly so would you expect because i've not seen all of the small print of this would you expect that if people have started receiving some of your product in that next payment period once the free trial is up and they've paid that you wouldn't have to give a refund would that be how you think that should work well at hip hop we don't offer a field free trial period so yeah when someone is there's a there's no free trial period so we don't have to navigate that which i think makes sense for a product like us yes yeah yeah that does make sense in terms of people's attitude to subscriptions it was just interesting hearing you know when Megan was chatting there to some people about how they manage it do you do you find that some people just merely the concept of a subscription is not something that they want to engage with because of the reputation that subscriptions might have and the fact that it's coming into an account every month rain or shine I think increasingly people are very very used to subscriptions and I think like Obi mentioned earlier it's a way to manage your money it's a regular payment for most people they know it's coming out so on the whole we find that people are very positive they engage with it it's something that they like to have but I think as a business you've got to make it super easy for them to cancel you know don't hide your email address at the bottom of something and make it really difficult for people you need to be open enable people to cancel and and then I think it works both ways interesting and what sort of proportion of your sales would be through subscription or just people making a straight order?

44:48So we've got around 30 % of our business is online and a significant chunk of that is subscription and growing. And we want it to grow because it's really important to a business like us. It's a predictable recurring revenue, it's critical to cash flow. And even beyond the financial aspects, it's a direct relationship with your most loyal customers, first party data. And like was mentioned earlier between Anita and Obi, it's a crucial part for a business that's looking for investment because investors really appreciate that annual recurring revenue piece. Emma, thank you so much. It's fascinating to hear what it's actually like running a business that has subscriptions in it and why it's important and where it works and where it might not.

45:33Emma Thackeray there, who's the co-founder of Hip Hop, which makes those soft drinks. 85058, if you want to join in our conversation about subscriptions, about chocolate, Easter Bank holiday, weekend, just round the corner. Chocolate maker Cadbury says it reckons that the UK chocolate market this time of year is worth around£700 million. It's the leading manufacturer with over half of the market share. So this time of year, boom time in Bourneville. and despite ingredient prices rocketing in recent years, the company reckons its cocoa content remains consistent, as if you'd say this time of morning.

46:08With that in mind, Wake Up To Money's Olivia Hutchinson paid a visit to the Cadbury headquarters in Birmingham. Only the crumbliest, flakiest chocolate Give me your tub a little shake. Just a weight of flavours and aromas. Take three. Deep sniffs. Yeah, and see what aromas come into mind. Okay, so we're having a little shake here Chocolates open slightly. Oh Yeah

46:43Hi, I'm Emily, I'm a sensory panelist at Cadbury's you always have such a good reaction People usually say my job's so boring in comparison to that. So yeah is definitely a little bit different and doesn't sound like it is an actual real job. This is our consumer research centre. It was opened in June last year and it's the home of our 48 sensory panellists, which we've just sat with 12 of them. We really try and understand what consumers are going to experience and our panellists help kind of articulate that for us. I'm Afshar Chubtai, so I'm a section manager, consumer science. We don't want them to be influenced by anything around them so we keep temperatures quite stable.

47:30We also actually say to them really think about what you're wearing to work so no perfume. If you've washed your clothes fabulous but no really strong fabric conditioner. Okay so we've just walked into the sensory kitchen we've heard from Emily already who was the chocolate taster on the other side but this is the other side of how it all works so presumably there's people working here kind of developing the chocolate, developing hot chocolate for the sensory panelists to taste. It is essentially a little secret passageway. The booths we just saw on the other side open up and the chocolate is passed through.

48:03As you can see there's all the weighing scales, exact weight of the powder, very accurate measuring of the liquid that goes in and then before the sample is given to the panelists we just check that everything is absolutely at the same temperature. And of Of course, it comes in so many different forms. We've seen people taste the little chocolate pieces, however. Hot chocolate, we can see here, and also this sort of chocolate spread. Chocolate spread, yeah. And for different markets as well. Different markets, yeah, absolutely. So the chocolate spreads we're evaluating here are for Greece, and then the hot chocolate beverages are for the UK market.

48:37Now, from the Consumer Research Centre, we've now hopped over to the old manufacturing offices here at Cadbury. Now this is where the research and development side of things all happens and where the Cadbury archives live. Hi, I'm Sarah Foden, Cadbury archivist. So this is a cabinet with all of Cadbury's Easter heritage in it. So lots of examples of packaging, moulds, different tubes, different Easter promotional items that we've done over time. Cadbury's earliest Easter egg, the first Easter egg was launched in 1875, so a long, long time ago. And that would have been a plain egg just filled with drajis, which were sugar-coated chocolates.

49:12and on the table we've got an example of what we call a fancy egg so this was launched in 1906 and that is an actual original egg in there so this is the original chocolate yes original how old is that then this chocolate 1920s early 1930s that sort of time period i'm looking at a cream egg mold in front of me and i believe that this is the same mold that's current day cream eggs will fit in? Yes so this mould actually dates back to 1971 which is when the current Capra cream egg plant was put in and today's cream egg will fit exactly into that mould because it is exactly the same size. So a lot of people remember cream eggs as being bigger when they were a child but that's not the case they're exactly the same size it's just that when you're a child your hands are smaller than they are when you're an adult so you just perceive it as being bigger but it's not.

50:02Hi I'm Tom Dingley I'm the MEU chocolate R &D director. My job is to create delicious products that all of our consumers enjoy every day. I work in our Bourneville R &D Global Centre of Excellence for Chocolate, and that's where we create all of the products for our global markets, but obviously particularly for Cadbury in the UK. 150 countries we sell our products in that we start developing here. The type of products you develop, of course, include Easter eggs, and we are approaching that time of year. What is involved in order to produce an Easter egg? We go through an iterative process of creating new ideas, testing them with consumers.

50:35you spent some time in our research facility today where we do some of that work to get to the absolute best product that we can before we then go into production in our factories many years ahead is the short answer for when we start thinking about easter we've got some easter eggs in front of us now actually let me just have a little look so we've got a Toblerone one Toblerone comes under the Mondelez parent company doesn't it and then we've got mini eggs and here is Cadbury and Lotus Biscoff a Lotus Biscoff filled egg and I believe this year is the first time you you've partnered with biscoff it's selling really really well and people are really enjoying it and it's something that we're taking now into other formats as well so we've launched our cadbury dairy milk biscoff filled tablet and these tablets you've just mentioned again we've got a couple in front of us a mini eggs one a cream eggs one these are essentially the big bars of chocolate that have little tiny pieces of of mini eggs or cream egg in and obviously all sorts of different um different things associated with cadbury so it's not just your traditional easter egg is it people People are always looking for something new and interesting and for novelty in Easter, as well as their chocolate in general.

51:38In the UK, we have around 4 ,000 employees, so we're a very large business. We're in Bourneville at the moment, and as you can see, it's a huge site. Been here for nearly 150 years. We have a huge capacity and huge capability to make lots of different things. In terms of scale, we're talking about 1.2 million cream eggs a day that we make in Bourneville. We make 1.5 million chocolate bars, chocolate tablets every day here as well, and over 12 million giant buttons every day. So we're talking huge scale. Thankfully, that's because people love our products so much. Taste like chocolate, never tasted before.

52:13Olivia Hutchinson there doing a report for us on Wake Up To Money going to the Cadbury's headquarters in Birmingham. I've intrigued a few messages, Anita, from people about chocolate quality. It's something that's most talked about this time of year, probably, about whether cabris has changed over the years or not. One thinking the cocoa content might be consistent, but it certainly isn't the same quality it was 15 years ago since it was sold off to its new owners. We heard one of the workers there saying, you know, the size of an egg hasn't changed. But yet when you have a look at the number of eggs you get in a pack compared to previous years, some saying that that's been getting smaller, that shrinkflation cost.

52:57Are you on top of this at Easter time? I'm on top of this. I was zoned out though. I was thinking of a hip hop can and a cream egg for the weekend. Sorted. Have you got all your Easter stuff? Started. I'm warming up. I'm warming up for this. But I'm loving the innovation this year on some of the eggs. Have you seen? No, go on. Just because of my retail mind for the world of green bean. I'm just loving how they're experimenting with chocolate, putting more pieces at the front, the packaging. We've definitely moved away from plastic. and just, I'm loving it. I was like, guys, you're doing well. Somebody got me a cheese Easter egg a few years ago.

53:32Oh, no. That's not okay. Deleted from the friend list. I see what you're trying with the innovation, but that is not for me. Just a bit of chocolate on Sunday morning is all I want. Right, Anita, it's been great to talk to you this morning. Good luck with the business in the coming months. Thank you. Anita Frost there. Obi, educate me as well. Thank you. And to everybody who's been in touch, that's it from Wake Up To Money. Wake Up To Money from BBC 5 Live That's it from Wake Up To Money You can download the podcast every Monday to Friday So please make sure you subscribe We'd also love it if you left us a review When you do, get in touch Keep the conversation going any time as well On social media, use the hashtag Wake Up To Money

54:18Welcome to the Wayne Rooney Show Wayne Rooney, Kay Curd and me, Kelly Somers break down the biggest stories in the Premier League and beyond. He's gone in quite quick, but he hasn't caught him high. I just don't think it's the red cards. Plus, we'll hear the funniest and most outrageous stories from Wayne's career. I was going into positions and doing things I shouldn't have really been doing, but you do it because you feel like you have to, and that helped us drive on and win the FA Cup. The Wayne Rooney Show. Watch your night, player. Listen on sound.