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Consumer Affairs

Pick and disconnect

M& S is generally regarded as a store in decline from its halcyon days of being the flagship retail, high street outlet. Several reasons are suggested for this: its failure over the last few years to create and deliver popular lines of ladies fashion; its internet resource; problems of [...]

March 16, 2016 // 0 Comments

The decline of the High Street

Figures released by the British Retail Consortium show that the number of high street shoppers in December 2015 was 2.2% down and there was a comparable decline in November. The greatest threat is the internet, £1 out of £5 was spent on line and shopping there increased by 15%. Moving from the [...]

January 23, 2016 // 0 Comments

Why am I surprised it’s coming to this ..?

As an ‘oldie’ I’m very conscious that modern technology if not life, is leaving me behind, albeit the fact doesn’t particularly bother me. After all, it wasn’t too long ago that I appreciated, while completing the survey of best/favourite songs that my brother occasionally conducts, that [...]

December 10, 2015 // 0 Comments

And the weekend is still yet to begin …

Regular readers of the Rust may be able to recall my report last week about being texted by my bank at home and being asked if I’d just spent over £200 on groceries in the United States. Shortly afterwards a phone call to their customer service line revealed that there had been an apparent [...]

November 28, 2015 // 0 Comments

Proving I’ve still got it …

There I was, minding my own business watching television last night, when at about 8.30pm a ‘ping’ indicated that a text had arrived on my mobile phone. So far so good. A short while later I wandered over to the sideboard to see whether at last Sophia Loren had seen sense, found herself staying [...]

November 17, 2015 // 0 Comments

An out of town diversion

This week found me staying overnight in the vicinity of Oxford for a meet with a pair of girlfriends with whom I share dimming but fond memories of borrowing and yore (“Can I borrow your shoulder-wrap/blouse/brooch/high-heels/boyfriend …?). This gathering of the distaff clans inevitably [...]

October 29, 2015 // 0 Comments

brand names and games

The other day needing a navy sweater I decided to purchase one from John Lewis website. The brand was Tommy Hilfiger. It was more expensive than the John Lewis cashmere even though it was of lesser quality material but it did have the crucial Hilfiger motif. So consumers will pay more for that [...]

October 28, 2015 // 0 Comments

Time to get real?

These days the fashion industry may pay lip service to political correctness when it comes to models and dress sizes, but leopards don’t change their spots. It was ever thus during my days in Fleet Street (and yes, I was around when Twiggy first hit the headlines) but I couldn’t [...]

October 24, 2015 // 0 Comments

Uber alles?

Chatting to Bob Tickler the other day on the topic of Internet v personal shopping, he mentioned to me that the council in Brighton are shortly going to decide whether to admit the private cab firm Uber to the city. Licensed taxi cabbies  are of course much against Uber. They argue that the [...]

October 23, 2015 // 0 Comments

Internet v shop visit

A debate raging over the sports pages of the Rust is the relative  benefits of attending  a sporting event or watching it at home. The same factors of convenience v social contact apply to the issue of Internet or personal shop visiting. I was asked to participate in a survey and rather than base [...]

October 1, 2015 // 0 Comments

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