Retailers worry about Christmas as fuel shortage further disrupts deliveries, stock
Fuel pumps are covered with plastic bags as a Texaco petrol station waits for a delivery on September 27, 2021 in Northwich, United Kingdom. (Photo by Christopher Furlong/Getty Images)
Even as the petrol and diesel shortage has eased and the situation has improved, retailers are beginning to worry about the shape of the all-important Christmas trading this year, with labour shortages continuing to threaten supply chains for everything from pork, petrol and poultry to medicines and milk.
While the forecourt stores bore the brunt of the fuel shortage, other retailers were also impacted nonetheless, with deliveries to the stores disrupted and availability of the stock at cash carries, already strained due to the lorry driver shortage, further affected.
“We are really affected in this shortage,” Imtiyaz Mamode, of Premier Gosport in Hampshire, said. “The suppliers are not coming on time, wholesalers are not coming on time, we are not getting much of fresh products, and even the deliveries are intermittent as well.”
Imtiyaz Mamode
Mamode added that they sometimes missed deliveries altogether as suppliers were lacking of fuel and didn’t want to risk it.
“One or two suppliers are based in London, so while driving from London to here they have to think whether they got enough fuel to go back and does it worth doing that or not. Because they have to wait for several hours in the queue,” he explained.
Nico Ali, who runs the Premier Top Shop store in Scotch Estate, Jarrow, says the situation is equally grim at cash and carries.
“You can't get most of the lines in the cash and carry. If I'm going to Booker in the morning, I'll have to do three or more cash and carries, like Bestway or United, to get supplies in. The thing is its very difficult. The shelves are bit empty in the shop,” he said.
Forecourt stores, meanwhile, have seen sales going down considerably in the two weeks of panic-buying fuel, as the long queues meant shoppers only wanted to get their fuel and go.
“Some of our members are talking about sales down between 20-30 per cent in convenience stores. Some even more,” said Gordon Balmer, executive director of Petrol Retailers Association (PRA) which represents independent fuel retailers who now account for 65 per cent of all UK forecourts.
“Motorists want to get into a forecourt, fill up and drive off. If they sit there any longer than they need to, they'll start to get some other people in the queue. And that means that they're not going to the store to buy your items,” he told Asian Trader.
Motorists queue outside a fuel filling station in Leyton, east London on September 29, 2021. (Photo by TOLGA AKMEN/AFP via Getty Images)
David Wyatt, owner of Shell/Costcutter fuel garage and convenience store on the A264 between Crawley and East Grinstead, West Sussex, concurred. Good Covid procedures meant the store usually attracted a lot of customers, but he said those customers were not coming in because they have so many cars on the forecourt.
Spectre of abuse
As tempers flared in the queues, petrol station staff sometimes found themselves at the receiving end of verbal and physical abuse, something we have seen earlier when retailers had to ensure Covid-appropriate behavior during the pandemic lockdowns.
“We have had some unfortunate incidents when people have obviously been trying to control the traffic queue and trying to make sure that fuel is purchased in an orderly manner. There have been some issues of unfortunate racial abuse, as well as threats of violence,” Balmer said.
Wyatt said people mostly co-operated with their efforts to maintain the flow of traffic. “But, you will always get the odd one person that wasn't happy to be told that he was going to be restricted or whatever,” he added. “I've had no real issues, a bit of abuse, but nothing really worth talking about.”
“Most people have been appreciated that we're taking the time to manage the queues, and restricting the sale so more people get it.”
David Wyatt
Wyatt, like many of his fellow retailers, used rationing to keep the petrol station open. “Whilst rationing we find that we can trade for a couple of days and we're out of stock for a day, then we trade for couple of days and out of stock for a day. It's not just us; surrounding garages aren't getting the supply they should have. So when whatever side gets fuel, they then get swamped, obviously,” he said.
And, even after two weeks of panic buying, he didn’t find things returning to normal. “I mean we're open today (Oct. 5) and we are still busier than we would normally be and there's still sites around us without fuel,” he said. “But it's not as bad as it was two weeks ago, so I would say its getting better.”
Balmer explained that the shortage has always been acute in London and the South East when compared to other areas because of the density of vehicles. “There's less fuel stations to serve more vehicles in the London area than other parts of the country,” he noted.
‘Get your stuff in now for Christmas’
Shortfalls in drivers and foreign workers have raised fears of more general shortages, with suppliers, wholesalers and supermarkets all struggling to stock up before Christmas.
Ali informs us that the wholesalers have already given the signal out to whomever Christmas buying: ‘There's already challenges, get your stuff in now for this Christmas, we're gonna struggle.’
Ali who gave out presents and hampers to the vulnerable people living in his estate and children coming into the store last Christmas, says that some products are already missing when he tried to get a few things for this year.
Nico Ali
“From my point of view, I think there is going to be certain lines we will not be able to get. Because when you go to that cash and carry to see if that stuff is there, if you're not there, and they had one, you will miss out. When we come in the morning, stock might be not there, but it might come in afternoon. To be honest, I think it's affecting everybody,” he says.
Wyatt agrees to that and suggests: “When you can buy something, get it. Don't assume you're going to get it next week, if that makes sense,” adding that it's inevitable that this is the ‘new norm’.
“As a country with Brexit, Covid and all the things that have gone on, I think this is more of the norm. We live in a country where a lot of it is last minute, food coming in, everything's on a tight schedule. So when something interrupts it, this is the end result,” he notes.
Balmer says that the issue is rather structural, concerning the logistics industry. “They need to quite simply get more lorry drivers.”
Britain is short of some 100,000 lorry drivers, according to the industry body Road Haulage Association, as a result of workers leaving the industry, Brexit and the pandemic, which put a stop to driver training and testing for about a year.
Ministers have repeatedly denied that the fuel crisis has anything to do with Brexit and have cast the trucker shortage as a global problem, though other European neighbours have not experienced queues at gas stations.
Polish lorry drivers rest and talk at Ashford International Truck Stop on December 22, 2020 in Ashford, United Kingdom. (Photo by Chris J Ratcliffe/Getty Images)
The government has made a U-turn on its tougher post-Brexit immigration policy, relaxing curbs to give short-term visas to 5,000 foreign lorry drivers and 5,500 poultry workers to help plug staffing gaps.
But in the week since ministers introduced the scheme to help fill vacancies, a meagre 27 applicants from the EU have come forward to drive tankers in the UK, even when 300 visas are earmarked for immediate issuance.
Labour shortages have raised fears of a shortage of turkeys for Christmas. Pig farmers are saying that the lack of butchers and abattoir workers - many from overseas - could see up to 120,000 animals slaughtered and incinerated rather than going into the food chain.
However, Prime Minister Boris Johnson is resisting any further easing, saying he wants to see a ‘high-wage, high-skill economy’ rather than mass immigration which would drive down salaries.
A silver lining
One thing that Mamode finds consolation in is the fact that customers now understand the issue of stock availability as they have now faced the same situation as well.
“Now the customer knows that it's not us who have been out of stock but all the supermarkets and other retail shops have also been facing this problem,” he says.
Pete Patel, who runs six stores, shares the sentiment. “When you go to supermarkets, they're also struggling, so everyone's accepted this as a general issue.” Consequently, no one's is panic buying in the stores, he adds.
Mamode, in fact, thinks the press has a lot to answer for the run on the pumps after supply issues initially prompted the temporary closure of a small number of retailers.
Shell/Costcutter garage and convenience store, Snow Hill, Crawley
“There's no shortage of anything. The only problem is the media is always doing something and trying to convince the audience that these are the shortages,” he asserts. “So when they are coming to know that there is a shortage, customers are trying to buy in bulk and basically they are suffering in the long run.”
He notes that the panic buying is making the shortage of a product and if customers buy the product in a quantity they used to buy there won't be any sort of shortage at all.
Pete tells us that he has seen a silver lining amid the fuel shortage: a return to shopping locally. “In fact, the fuel shortage has actually helped me with sales in the last week because people are not driving anywhere.”
Local shops will face significant new pressures as a result of today’s Budget, the Association of Convenience Stores (ACS) has warned.
Chancellor Rachel Reeves' budget's impact will be felt unevenly across the UK’s 50,000 convenience stores, with some measures such as business rate relief and the increased employment allowance mitigating costs for smaller independent stores, while providing no help for chains and larger independent businesses.
The key measures for local shops announced by the Chancellor, and the costs for local shops associated with them, are:
National Living Wage to increase to £12.21 per hour
National Minimum Wage (18-20 rate) to increase to £10 per hour
Cost to the convenience sector next year: £7.739bn (increase of £513m)
Employers’ National Insurance Contributions to rise to 15 per cent
Threshold for Employers’ National Insurance contributions to fall to £5,000 per year
Employment Allowance to rise to £10,500 a year
Cost to the convenience sector next year: £397m (increase of £85m)
Retail and hospitality rate relief reduced from 75 per cent to 40 per cent
Small business multiplier frozen for 2025/26
Cost to the convenience sector: £267m (increase of £68m)
Total cost of main announcements (year-on-year difference): £666m
ACS Chief Executive James Lowman said: “The cold hard facts are that the measures announced in the past 24 hours have added two-thirds of a billion pounds to the direct cost base of the UK’s local shops. At a time when trade is tough and operating costs are stubbornly high, this will be challenging for our members to absorb and there will be some casualties on high streets and in villages and estates across the country.
“Not all shops will be impacted the same. The smallest retailers, with low NICs bills and lower rateable values for their shops, will benefit from the welcome increase in the employment allowance and the retention of 40% of the retail, hospitality and leisure business rates relief. Retailers with a larger store, a number of sites or those operating a chain will receive limited benefit from these mitigations, and this will impact their ability to invest and to continue to offer services in the communities they serve.
The following additional measures were announced by the Chancellor in the Budget speech today:
Flat rate levy on vaping liquids from October 2026 of £2.20 per 10ml
Fuel duty frozen and the 5p cut extended for another year
A new commitment to tackling shop theft and funding directed to tackling organised gangs
Lowman continued: “The Chancellor’s commitment to tackling shop theft will be warmly welcomed by our members, but they are interested only in action and in crime against their stores and their colleagues being tackled effectively. We stand ready to help implement a new, and better-funded strategy to stop shop theft, abuse and violence against our members.”
Parliament is to launch an inquiry into delays in compensation settlements for sub postmasters affected by the Horizon scandal.
The newly-formed Business and Trade Select Committee will call ministers, subpostmasters and their lawyers to give evidence next week with a second session to follow in mid-November. The Committee’s chair, Liam Byrne MP told ITV News that there was “definitely a delay” in people coming forward for payment.
“What we’re hearing from subpostmasters is that if there is an argument about how much should be paid out, the first offer is made quite quickly but if there’s a negotiation, that negotiation is dragging.
“We on the committee are going to batter away at this, week in, week out, until it is job done. All of us on our committee are frankly horrified and outraged by how long this has taken and we’re just not going to give up, ” he said.
Sir Alan Bates, the Post Office campaigner and chair of the Justice for Subpostmasters Alliance, is expected to be invited to give evidence. Earlier this month, Sir Alan states that his own claim had not been addressed and that he had written to prime minister Sir Keir Starmer asking for his intervention.
“Like many of the groups, my claim has not been completed. It’s ridiculous. I am one of just many in this position. This is why I wrote to the Prime Minister at the start of October, asking that he instruct the department to ensure that all claims – and I’m talking about in the GLO group, the original 555 – have been completed by March next year," he said.
This comes weeks after the Post Office's outgoing CEO agreed the government is using the company as a "shield" over compensation schemes. Nick Read, who resigned last month, was giving evidence at the Post Office Horizon IT Inquiry for the second day, with a focus on delays to victims' financial redress.
He also admitted that the compensation process has been "overly bureaucratic" and expressed "deep regret" that the Post Office had not lived up to delivering "speedy and fair redress".
Convenience store body Association of Convenience Stores (ACS) today (30) has warned the Chancellor about the negative effects of the new National Living Wage (NLW) increase, a day after the Chancellor announced a pay rise for over 3 million workers next year, with NLW rates rising by 6.7 perc cent.
From April 2025, the NLW will increase from £11.44 to £12.21 while 18-20 National Minimum Wage will rise by £1.40 per hour to £10 - the largest increase on record, marking the first step towards a single adult rate.
ACS chief executive James Lowman said, “Our members are grappling with how to afford this inflation-busting increase in wage costs. The market remains tough, with many retailers reporting flat or declining sales while expenses like banking charges, credit card processing fees and energy bills are eating away at their profitability.
"More than ever, we need help from the Chancellor in the Budget. Without sustained and enhanced help on business rates, a reduction in National Insurance Contributions, and effective incentives to drive investment, our sector faces a challenging future. For some communities, this could mean the viability of their local shop is put at risk.”
Evidence provided to the Low Pay Commission by ACS earlier this year already found that to handle the increases in national wage increases, 53 per cent of retailers have reduced the amount they invest in their business, 53 per cent have been forced to increase their prices in store, and 47 per cent have had to take lower profits.
Baroness Philippa Stroud, Chair of the Low Pay Commission (LPC), stated that data already shows signs of employers finding it harder to adapt to minimum wage increases.
A Rossendale shop has had a licence bid rejected after repeatedly selling vapes to children and having illegal products on its premises.
Management at the Ibra Superstore at 34 Burnley Road, Bacup, have shown ‘no regard’ for children’s protection and safety, and have insufficient controls for licensing, Rossendale councillors have ruled.
Ibrahim Mohammad, director of the Ibra Superstore, had recently applied to Rossendale Council for a new premises licence. But the borough’s licensing sub-committee rejected his bid after a meeting which heard allegations from the police and trading standards officers.
The Burnley Road shop has been subject to various licensing changes and concerns in recent years. In the past, it was called Bacup Wines.
Ibrahim Mohammad, the applicant, attended the Rossendale licensing sub-committe meeting with his father,Amin Mohammad. Also there was PC Mick Jones, of Lancashire Constabulary, and Jason Middleton of Lancashire Trading Standards. Councillor Bob Bauld attended as an observer.
Mr Mohammad wanted a premises license for alcohol sales and opening hours from 8am to 11pm, seven days a week. He already had a personal licence. He said the Bacup shop would install a CCTV system, keep an incident log and a refusals record, check customers’ ages, display information about staff and give them regular training.
Trading standards officer Jason Middleton said Ibra Superstore Ltd was incorporated as a company in April 2023. Since then, trading standards had received 11 complaints about under-age sales and carried out visits.
Breaches included non-compliant vapes being found which broke a 2ml limit on the quantity of nicotine-containing liquid, no age checks and no information on display.
During one visit, Amin Mohammad tried to leave with a bag containing 10 illegal vapes. In test purchases by trading standards, an ‘Elf Bar’ vape was sold to a 14-year-old by Amin Mohammad and an illegal Hayati Pro Max vape to a 13-year-old by Ibrahim Mohammad. The shop claimed a phone call distracted staff during the 13-year-old’s purchase and illegal vapes came from ‘a man in car’.
Councillors heard different speakers, looked at written reports and also some video footage from the applicant. But they rejected the premises licence bid.
Giving their reasons, they stated: “There was a repeated history and pattern of behaviour regarding under-age sales of age-restricted items, such as tobacco products and vapes to children. You must not sell vapes to anyone under the age of 18. This is a criminal offence which the council takes very seriously.
“It is clear you breached the law by failing a test purchase operation in which you sold an illegal vape to an under-age child. The sub-committee feels that you have no regard to the protection and safety of children.
“The sub-committee feels that there is insufficient management control at the premises. There is no credible system to prevent under-age sales of age-restricted products and no measures in place to avoid harm to children and to prevent crime and disorder
“Therefore, given the number of incidents, the circumstances surrounding the incidents and the fact that the matter involves safeguarding issues relating to young, vulnerable minors, we consider that the seriousness of the incidents and the crimes committed against young children undermines the licensing objectives to prevent crime and disorder, and protect children from harm.”
The shop has the right of appeal to a magistrates court within 21 days of the date of the notice.
SPAR North of England retailer Dara Singh Randhawa’s family store has been awarded £100,000 of free stock after hitting all his targets since moving to the symbol.
Dara and his family, who have their SPAR store in Patrington in the East Riding of Yorkshire, joined SPAR through its association with James Hall & Co. Ltd in August 2023 having taken the decision to maximise the store’s potential.
It is a decision they have not looked back on, with sales increasing by up to 25% and margins also showing significant uplift in the last 12 months.
Key to the store’s improved performance is the complete overhaul of products available in-store, particularly the fresh food range, to better support people who live in Patrington and the surrounding area.
A new store layout and refrigeration, better Food To Go and meal deal options, a coffee machine, and a Calippo slush machine were also installed during a major refurbishment prior to launch.
Dara said: “Our move to SPAR has been excellent. We have seen fantastic sales uplift and the support from the team at James Hall & Co. Ltd has been brilliant. The £100,000 of free stock is the cherry on the cake.
“We have been very impressed with the Price Locked promotions, in particular. These give customers confidence to do bigger shops with us as they see value on our shelves and the products at the same prices for longer.
“At times over the summer when tourists and visitors to the area add trade, we have seen sales £6,000 a week higher than our average. This is against a backdrop of the popular caravan park in the village being closed almost all year.
“We are really pleased with the position we are in, and we will be looking to achieve more in 2025.”
Peter Dodding, Sales Director at James Hall & Co. Ltd and Chairman of the SPAR Northern Guild, said: “Congratulations to Dara and the Randhawa family on hitting their targets and earning £100,000 of free stock.
“We recognise switching brand is a big decision for a retailer which is why this isn’t a gimmick, and we offer this to all retailers who join the SPAR family with James Hall & Co. Ltd.
“As well as our £100,000 incentive, we also offer retailers the chance to achieve up to an additional £5,000 of free stock if they successfully refer a friend.
“These opportunities provide additional motivation to retailers alongside the comprehensive benefits that joining the SPAR brand brings with it.”
James Hall & Co. Ltd is a fifth-generation family business which serves a network of independent SPAR retailers and company-owned SPAR stores across Northern England six days a week from its base at Bowland View in Preston.