Britain’s tea drinkers are a dying breed as younger customers desert the traditional builder’s brew in favour of trendier alternatives, the owner of PG Tips has warned. A growing shift among younger consumers toward herbal tea and coffee means that PG Tips and Lipton maker Unilever (ULVR) is struggling to grow the brands in developed countries such as the UK and US. Finance boss Graeme Pitkethly said: “I drink five or six cups of builder’s tea a day, but unfortunately we are dying at a faster rate than generation Z and millennials are consuming it. “They might drink tea but they want to drink quite high-end, expensive products. They drink a lot of coffee.
Shares in retail property firm Capital & Regional (CAL) leapt the most in a decade yesterday, after the company accepted a £150m offer from South Africa’s Growthpoint Properties that will make the group its majority owner. The decision lifted C&R, which owns shopping centres including The Marlowes in Hemel Hempstead, to the top of the FTSE All-Share index. If the deal is passed, Growthpoint will hold just more than 51% of the company’s shares. C&R is currently sitting on a heavy debt pile, which the South African group hopes to cut.
Grafton Group Units (GFTU), the owner of Selco and Buildbase, has warned on profits as consumers cut back on DIY home improvement projects. The FTSE 250 building materials supplier said on Thursday that annual profit would be 4% to 8% lower than the £193.5m projected by analysts. The warning comes as the UK construction sector grapples with weak demand from households and wider economic uncertainty. Grafton said sales in the Netherlands were dampened by a court ruling on nitrogen emissions, which led to delays in permits for new construction projects.
