Good morning dear readers,
Aldi Süd is planning what is probably the largest online offensive in the company’s history. In the USA, the discounter is testing a web shop for fresh groceries, which, according to information from the Handelsblatt, should be the blueprint for an online delivery service in Germany. According to insiders, the start of an offer in Germany is already planned for the first half of 2023. For the company, the offensive would be a risky turning point. So far, no provider in Germany has made money with the online trade in fresh food.
Handelsblatt retail expert Florian Kolf knows the details and names the open questions:
- Why the owner family is still hesitating.
- What a collaboration with Aldi Nord could look like.
- Why competitor Lidl is ahead in online business.
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The Prime Ministers’ Conference is a body that our constitution does not actually provide for, but which temporarily became the country’s actual center of power during the corona crisis. Today the round comes to new honor: the federal and state governments want to discuss, among other things, the planned electricity and gas price brake.
The draft resolution of the Federal Chancellery, which was made known in advance, shows:
- The gas price brake should take effect a month earlier. It will be introduced on March 1st as previously planned, but “it is intended to have retrospective effect on February 1st, 2023”.
- The electricity price brake that is also planned is to come into force on January 1st. The federal government wants to cap the price of electricity for private households at 40 cents per kilowatt hour from the beginning of next year. This should apply to a basic quota of 80 percent of annual consumption. For industrial companies, electricity prices would be capped at 13 cents per kilowatt hour for 70 percent of the previous year’s consumption.
- Some of the money for the relief in the electricity sector is to be collected from companies. The draft states: “To finance the relief in the electricity sector, random profits from electricity generation and from gas, oil and coal companies and refineries will be skimmed off for a limited period of time.”
When designing the gas price brake, the federal government apparently wants to stick as closely as possible to the recommendations of the corresponding expert commission. You can find everything about their final report here.
Changes by the countries are to be expected. The prime ministers are also debating with the federal government about the planned nationwide 49-euro ticket for local transport and about the refugee costs.
So far, nothing is known about a secret plan by the Chancellery: According to this, prime ministers would have to continue to pay the full electricity and gas price if Olaf Scholz caught them playing Candy Crush during the deliberations.
After more than a year of opposition, Benjamin Netanyahu could face a return to the post of prime minister, according to forecasts in Israel. In the fifth parliamentary election within three and a half years, the right-wing religious camp around the 73-year-old achieved a narrow majority of 61 to 62 out of 120 seats.
His right-wing conservative Likud party was the strongest with 30 to 31 seats. According to the forecasts, Prime Minister Jair Lapid’s Future Party comes right behind them with 22 to 24 seats. The image may still shift before all votes have been counted. The final result is not expected before Thursday.
Do you remember the purpose thing? Back then, before Corona and the Ukraine war, in the years that seem good to us today, it was the latest trend in management fads: companies should formulate a higher purpose for themselves. Because employees who believe in the sense of their own actions are more motivated than those who only count down the days until retirement – an important competitive advantage.
First of all, there is nothing wrong with that. At the moment, of course, more tangible competitive advantages are decisive for companies: Can I get cheap energy somehow? How quickly can I decarbonize my business model? And how do I get the missing parts from China to my factory?
The current crisis has also led to interesting shifts in terms of purpose. This is shown by an as yet unpublished study by the management consultancy Globeone, which specializes in the subject. More than 4,300 consumers were asked how they judge corporate brands in terms of sustainability, authenticity, honesty, profit orientation and future viability. The armaments group Rheinmetall has improved significantly. Weapons that help to stop the Russians in Ukraine are apparently more useful than weapons that rot in the Bundeswehr depot.
Striking: The large German housing companies, whose social purpose should actually be obvious (namely to create affordable housing), are perceived as particularly implausible when it comes to purpose. Or, as a management consultant might say in his purpose pitch: there is still upside potential.
And then there is the new master of the communication service Twitter, who now calls himself the “Twitter Complaint Hotline Operator” on his own account. Last night Elon Musk tweeted his plans for the new premium account: There should be a verified user profile for eight dollars a month, which has so far been available for free. Furthermore, better visibility of your own contributions, fewer advertisements and access to content from other media that are otherwise behind a paywall.
Our suggestion: Why stop halfway? Why not create a completely individualized Twitter world for every premium user, in which the number of your own followers grows every day, your own tweets are retweeted at least 200 times, your own comments reap storms of enthusiasm and your own opponents sink into the shitstorm every day anew? If virtual reality, then right. I even pay 80 euros a month for this.
I wish you a day when you know how to inspire even without a premium account.
Best regards
Her
Christian Rickens
Editor-in-Chief Handelsblatt