Adam and Dan discuss results for snack giant Walkers, funding for an F1 supplier and the highest earning Christmas songs.
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00:00The results for Snack Giant Walkers, funding for a manufacturer which supplies F1 teams
00:04and the highest earning Christmas songs, all featuring today's Business Briefing, sponsored
00:08by Shawbrook.
00:09So what are you kicking us off with today, Dan?
00:16Walkers, possibly the nation's favourite crisps, I've got their results, but before we go into
00:21that have you got a favourite brand of theirs?
00:22Yeah, I like a packet of Quavers or a Cheese and Onion, you know, classic.
00:26Can't go wrong with those, I'm a big fan of sensations personally, chilli sensations.
00:30Once I've started eating those there's no going back.
00:33Well you might associate Walkers with Leicester, especially with their ties to Gary Lineker,
00:38and they were founded in Leicester by Henry Walker in 1948, but they now have their head
00:42office in Reading.
00:43Their brands include Doritos, Frazzles, Monster Munch, Quavers and Whatzits, and they're owned
00:47by PepsiCo, the food giant headquartered in New York, but I grew up on Lays rather than
00:52Walkers, which is also owned by PepsiCo because I grew up in Cyprus, and obviously that's
00:57the equivalent there.
00:58They have a Leicester snack as well.
00:59Oh yeah, absolutely.
01:00While they look similar in branding, there are differences in the packaging and flavouring.
01:04But going into the results, Walkers had a good 2023, they achieved a turnover of £359
01:09million, which is almost £50 million higher than what they got in 2022.
01:15That led to a profit before tax of £31.6 million, up from £28.4 million.
01:20Their manufacturing arm was their best performing division.
01:23Their distribution and marketing arms unfortunately saw profits fall, but all round a good year
01:27for the company.
01:28Yeah, and definitely an iconic British brand.
01:30Oh yeah, absolutely.
01:32On a slightly different note, we've got one involving motorsport from me, with Midlands
01:37manufacturer MV Composites.
01:38Now they make components for Formula 1 teams, and their co-founders actually met while working
01:43for Red Bull Racing.
01:45Now the company has secured £150,000 from the Midlands Engine Investment Fund too, and
01:51the company, which recently recorded a tenfold rise in turnover and tripled its footprint
01:58with a move to a 5,000 square foot premises, will use the funding to complete the fit-out
02:03and create five new jobs over the coming weeks.
02:08So definitely a good news story for the Midlands there.
02:10Yeah, very good.
02:11Again, on a different note, I've been looking at the most popular Christmas songs, and that's
02:16based on how much the artists have earned in Spotify royalties since the initial release.
02:21The list looked at each song's number of streams as of November 2024, and royalties were calculated
02:26on the basis that each stream earns approximately £0.003.
02:30But before I go into that list again, have you got a favourite Christmas song?
02:34I think it has to be Last Christmas for me, classic.
02:36Absolute classic.
02:37Cypriot as well?
02:38Of course.
02:39It's by Slade, Happy Christmas Everybody, but it's not on the list, unfortunately.
02:43That's a bit surprising, isn't it?
02:44Yeah, they've been robbed, in my opinion.
02:46But featured on the list are Sia, Michael Buble, and Justin Bieber, amongst others.
02:50But I won't go into the full list, because that'll take quite a while, but I'll go into
02:53the top three.
02:54So in third place, we've got Santa Tell Me, which has reportedly earned Ariana Grande
02:59around £3.6 million in streaming royalties.
03:02Second place, we've got Your Favourite, Last Christmas, which has made around £5.3 million.
03:07First place, obviously, got All I Want for Christmas Is You, Mariah Carey, classic, £6.2
03:12million in royalties on Spotify.
03:15Globally, the song has been played over 1.9 billion times.
03:18But when the song first came out in 1994, it only peaked at 12th place on the Billboard
03:24Hot 100.
03:25Obviously now, it's the most played Christmas song, I'd say.
03:29Just to finish up, you've got a story from JLL?
03:31That's right, yeah.
03:32Good news story for the regional office market.
03:36JLL have released the latest Big Six research, which covers office activity across Birmingham,
03:44Bristol, Leeds, Edinburgh, Glasgow, and Manchester.
03:48Now, it said that rebound activity has rebounded to its highest level since 2022, with office
03:57leasing in the Big Six hitting £1.3 million square foot in the third quarter.
04:02Now, it also added that leasing has now reached £3.3 million square foot this year, which
04:06is actually 24% ahead of the same point last year.
04:10Now, JLL expects the total amount of space leased across the whole of 2024 will actually
04:15exceed the five-year average of £4 million square foot, which would represent at least
04:21an 8% increase on 2023.
04:23So, nice to know that activity is picking up.
04:25Great to see those numbers on the rise, definitely.
04:27Definitely, and now you can read more about those stories or others at
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