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Private Equity insiders admit that that running supermarkets in Britain has been way tougher than they expected. ‘The masters of the universe can usually spin straw into gold,’ said one commentator. 'But their efforts at British supermarket chains Asda and Morrisons makes them look really stupid. It’s embarrassing.’
It should have been easy. Take over a so-so supermarket chain, make a few whizzy changes, watch the valuation soar, and sell out at a massive profit. Â Bosh!
But Asda and Morrisons have languished, weighed down by the piles of debt issued by the private equity owners. Â The interest on those debts is massive, and means that neither chain can invest in stores, staff or supply chains. Â All the masters of the universe can do is to cut costs, sack staff and amp up the marketing campaigns.
The superhero private equity geeks are being beaten hands down by people who actually have some experience in running stores. One of those geeks sobbed to us privately. ‘It seemed like a really easy gig. Put in a few months working 24/7 to turn things around, and then walk away with millions in bonuses.  Instead, I’ve been working 24/7 for years, and all I’ve got is a shopping card that gives me ten per cent off. The stores are dirty, understocked, understaffed and expensive - even I don’t want to shop there. Why didn’t I choose a deal in financial services, software or health?’
Meanwhile, all those dyed-in-the-wool, nation-of-shopkeepers types are twisting the knife, doing all the things that the private equity owned shops can’t do. Like selling food at a competitive price in a store that shoppers actually want to visit.
image from pixabay
The new Netflix series, With Love, Meghan, launches on January 15. But already the fan of the Duchess is raving about some of the astonishing food hacks contained in the lifestyle-promotional televisual plea for absolution and lots, lots more attention. ‘I bought myself a House of Sussex notebook and pen and made copious content notes. And – as Meghan advised - finished each with a heart and smiley, and other emojis, to detract from the imperativeness of the standard cooking advice lexicon.’
Smiling pan-racially at every moment, the Duchess welcomes culinary neophytes into a cutting-edge world of insta-conscious gustatory presentational techniques. And what she has unleashed in sustenential positivity is being talked up in some quarters as full karmic compensation for all those years of Covid. For this is not your average cookery show. It is the full, para-royal inversion of a genre.
In the trailer for the series, Meghan can be seen picking produce from her garden and warmly ignoring her father. Back in her Montecito kitchen, while Harry cleans the oven with a very old toothbrush, Meghan spends the first hour of the show thanking her ‘amazing team’ one by one. Using words such as ‘fantastic’ and (again) ‘amazing’ she says that she is ‘beyond grateful for the support’, leaving viewers pondering how ‘beyond grateful’ might take form in language or emotion.
Then it’s down to business! Lentils, the Duchess explains, don’t look good in most close-up shots, even the red ones that are actually from India. So Ms Markle walks viewers through the process of using image editing techniques to make tasteless brown mush gleam like the diamonds worn by the whore played by Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman. While the food on the plate looks about as appetizing as Walsall street pizza, the resulting image would make you want to eat the screen through which it fakes.
At which point the show ends, leaving viewers gasping at the ingenuity of the knowhow, the smiliness of the Duchess, and the fantastic, amazing teaminess of the team. But be careful! Despite the Duchess’s heartfelt encomiums for a delicate moderation in all things diet, With Love, Meghan is product you might just want to binge.Â
Editor's note: The best interpretation we can make of the term 'beyond grateful' is 'not grateful any more.'
Picture credit: deskpilot
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