Last train from Derby?

So, the Department of Transport has awarded the contract for £1.4bn worth of new trains - for the new Thameslink route - to Siemens of Germany, instead of a rival bid from Bombardier of good ol' Derby. Here in Axminster, a firm who were supplying components to Bombardier consequently missed out too.

Another shameful, short-sighted, bonkers decision.

Value for money for the UK tax payer? What about decreased taxes and increased benefit payments in Derby when Bombardier - our last train manufacturing facility (after the French closed the world famous Metro Cammell works in Birmingham (where my Granddad worked) a few years' ago) - inevitably closes? Yet another skill lost to the UK forever. Then, whether the Government of the day wants it or not, EVERY train ordered for use in the UK will HAVE to be foreign-made. So much for Cameron's new-found love of manufacturing. When is this country going to wake up?

I won't bother setting an alarm clock.

When a Lidl becomes too much

Tesco (rightly) receives a lot of criticism for opening too many stores within a small area. Witness the recent 'Tesco Riots' in Bristol and the outcry when Tesco was allowed to build in Seaton, despite there already being seven Tesco stores within a 21 mile radius.

In East Devon, the retail giant has enjoyed a 50% success rate with recent applications to the Sidmouth-based authority: Honiton (close to Sidmouth) and Ottery (close to Sidmouth) were both rejected. As compensation, Seaton (also close to Sidmouth, but historically a seaside rival) and Axminster (virtually in Dorset, so of little interest to councillors in East Devon) both get lumbered with ridiculously oversized developments.

But little seems to have been said about the meteoric rise of Lidl. In these days of Food Mile consciousness, with much of the German discount chain's non-fresh items being trucked in from mainland Europe, their success is a little hard to fathom... whilst the fact that all of their profits leave the UK is especially frustrating.

A report in this week's Pulman's View from Axminster suggests that Lidl recently tried to buy a chunk of land from Axminster Community College. Call me naive, but I wouldn't have thought building supermarkets on school playing fields was a particularly good PR move. What next - demolishing care homes to make way for convenience stores?

When I first moved to Axminster five-or-so years' ago, there was a single local Lidl - in Chard. And a nice novelty it was too. There was also one, a little further afield, in well-to-do Sidmouth, which I always found a little bizarre. Since then, Crewkerne and Bridport have opened, with Honiton almost ready too. How many Lidl stores does an area need?

But they needn't worry about being rebuffed by education chiefs in Axminster. When the town's Tesco doubles in size I expect the Co-op will become free...

Your caring, sharing Co-op

When The Co-op rebranded as The Co-operative back in 2007, their strong (although not perfect), contemporary, new identity was successfully applied across all divisions of the group, and on a smaller scale, across all types of own-brand food packaging. The latter was especially impressive - each item of packaging would follow the same, strict corporate guidelines, with type and layout remaining consistent throughout, only the colour-ways changing from the value to the mid-range to the high-end products.

McCann Erikson of London were responsible for the rebranding, but gradually their work has been diluted. Firstly, The Co-operative's purchase of Somerfield saw the 'The Co-op' inexplicably ditch their family-look Everyday range, in favour of Somerfield's clumsily-titled Simply Value range. Now, Manchester's GJ Creative have tinkered with the Truly Irresistible range (another naff name), helping to produce a now confused-looking food portfolio.

The Co-operative needed to tweak the flavour, quality and pricing of its food. Not the packaging.

And we just couldn't resist the nostalgic inclusion of the Co-op slogan and logo from the 1970s. Memories!

Focus a little blurred

Sad to see the 'closing down' signs go up at my local DIY store - Focus in Chard. Seemed to spend half of my life in there when I bought my house in Axminster five-or-so years' ago.

So, why has the Focus chain failed?

Off the top of my head, three things spring to mind:

1. A failure to adapt to the changing world of DIY, as B&Q and Homebase have done, by offering a wider and more contemporary range of homeware and soft furnishings.

2. The wishy-washy name. Think the 'Do It All' brand, from their own back catalogue, is ballsier.

3. The colour scheme. That dark blue always looked drab, whether on uniforms or signage. The yellow and blue would've looked much brighter and stronger reversed, with a nice, bright yellow as the main background colour.

Let's hope the staff get fixed up with alternative employment very soon.

With my little eye

How many I-Spy points for these? Over the last few days, I’ve seen an immaculate Mk I Honda Accord in Poole, a Talbot Sunbeam Lotus in Bridport, a Commer camper van on the way to Exeter (which reminded me that I used to want one - I now want one again) and a Renault Fuego in Weymouth. When was the last time ANYONE saw a Renault Fuego?!

I had a look on eBay to see how many Mk I Accords, Sunbeam Lotuses, Commer Campers and Fuegos there were available. Only three. Surprisingly, all Commers.

Wonder how much is in my PayPal account?

Thanks, Tesco!

Do the writers of some of the letters in the local press seriously believe that Tesco has saved Seaton from having (another) derelict holiday camp a stone's throw from the seafront?

Do they not remember that it was the very same Tesco that bought the (thriving) holiday camp, and swimming pool and nursery, closed them all down, then demolished them?

Obviously not.

Wherefore art thou, Romeo?

Worryingly, Volkswagen - manufacturers of reliable, if a little dull, motor cars - are still reported to be sniffing around Alfa Romeo - manufacturers of charismatic, if a little unreliable, motor cars - to add them to their already sizeable family.

On the face of it, using the 'opposites attracting' philosophy, it's a good fit.

Certainly better than the 1980s, when Alfa and Nissan got together to create the Arna. Instead of marrying Alfa's beautiful bodywork to Nissan's bulletproof mechanicals, they did it the other way round... so we got a Nissan Cherry that broke down rather a lot.

But does the world need yet another set of cars based on VW's PQ35 platform? We already have, by my maths, 18 (eighteen).

And where does this all leave SEAT - who Volkswagen labelled their 'Spanish Alfa Romeo'?

But more to the point, did the world ever need a Spanish Alfa Romeo? Given that SEAT have consistently failed to return a profit under VW ownership, I guess the answer is 'no'.

Not so innocent

Interesting 'David versus Goliath' story in the latest edition of Marketing Week.

Dawn Reid, a single mother of two, spotted a gap in the market and launched her own range of child-friendly vitamins in July 2010.

Good on her.

By January 2011, she had them stocked in no less a place than Waitrose.

Impressive stuff.

Trouble is, of all the names she could've chosen, she opted to use Innocent. That's right, as in the smoothie manufacturer 58% owned by the mighty Coca-Cola. Well, if you're going to pick a fight, you might as well make it a big one.

Worse still, not only has Reid used the same name, she's also chosen a similar logo (sans-serif font, all lower-case). Alarmingly similar ethos too, if you scan her website.

Given the original Innocent's diversification into juices and snack pots, it surely wouldn't be inconceivable that they would branch out into the similarly healthy world of vitamins. Yet Reid insists that consumers won't confuse the two brands... despite her using a look-alike logo. She's also concerned that a larger company can seek ownership of a commonplace word such as 'innocent' - but what she fails to realise is that branding goes way, way, way beyond a name.

I usually root for the underdog, but, sorry, in this case I think the hound's completely in the wrong. You could say that it's barking up the wrong tree.

Norma Jeane and the ugly Exeter shop

Surely the most overused (and misused) word of the moment is 'iconic'. Back in my day, it was usually reserved for things like Marilyn Monroe and the Mini (the original, not the bloated German pastiche that we have today).

Recently, I've heard the former Debenhams' building in Exeter, disgraced ex-Sky Sports duo Richard Keys and Andy Gray, and now stricken (and little-known) retailer British Bookshops & Stationers all described using the i-word.

Sadly, those guilty - an Exeter City Councillor, the Boss of talkSPORT and the bookshop chain's Administrator - seem to have little idea as to the true meaning of the word.

Maybe, and somewhat poetically, they're being ironic when using the word iconic? Let's hope so.

The Italian job

When I was an art student, back in the early-90s (he says, suddenly feeling really rather old), and having just passed my driving test, the car I wanted was a Lancia Y10 – a somewhat quirky offering, blessed with sharp, confident Italian styling (that’s been carried over into its Ypsilon successor today), that was, even back then, a rarity on British roads. I lusted after one... until I test drove an example with my father, one Saturday afternoon in Liskeard, and soon realised that the Y10’s Fiat Uno-derived gearchange was about as slick as a bowl of stone-cold porridge.

Nevertheless, I’ve always retained a soft spot for Lancia. I’ve only ever owned cars made in the once-sprawling Longbridge factory, on the outskirts of Birmingham (several family members worked there in its heyday), and I’ve always found Lancias, Alfas and FIATs (few people seem to realise that FIAT is an acronym, standing for Fabricators of Italian Automobiles in Turin) a similar proposition – namely slightly-flawed cars but which have bucket loads of soul.

When I was a kid, I could, apparently name every car on the road by the age of three, so, before I discovered football (and then girls), cars were very much my passion – I was encyclopedic about them. I remember my Mom (us Midlanders also use that American spelling) coming home from shopping one day, very excited by a car she had seen. She took me back out to see it - that bright red Series II Fulvia Coupé that I saw (it was slightly before my time, so I had never heard of it until then) remains one of the most beautiful pieces of industrial design that I’ve ever seen. Gorgeous.

So, the news that Lancias are finally to return to these shores was met with somewhat mixed emotions. Mixed, you see, since the UK is going to be the only market in Europe where the likes of the bold, new Delta are to be rebadged as Chrysler, as a result of FIAT’s stake in the US firm. Who am I to criticise Fiat boss Sergio Marchionne, who has, after all, seemingly single-handedly taken the company from almost-certain bankruptcy to being a major global player?

But his lazy, penny-pinching decision to sell rebadged Lancias through the UK’s existing Chrysler network – given his usual midas touch – seems curious at best (it's not as if the Chrysler brand is popular over here - the company only sold 1400 cars in the UK last year). Sure, sell them at Chrysler outlets – rather than Alfa dealers – if you wish, but spend a few quid on some Lancia signage – you’re already paying to convert them to RHD and it’s not like you’re setting up an entire new network, for heaven’s sake!

It’s very much a case of Lancia Chalk and Chrysler Cheese. The former have made some of the sexiest, most innovative cars of all-time. The latter’s previous two big pushes into the UK have given us the Horizon in the 70s and the Neon in the 90s. God help us. Anyway, must dash – either my stomach’s rumbling or that’s Vincenzo Lancia turning in his grave.

Slow boat from China

I was reading an article today by Audrey Mealia of gift company Paladone Products, explaining how they've cut the carbon footprint on their range of novelty washing-up brushes (yes, apparently there is a market for such things).

With the help of Rob Holdway of low-carbon design consultants Giraffe Innovation, they have managed to reduce packaging costs by 15% and slash the carbon emission by a whopping 85%. Elsewhere, Holdway talks about cutting pack sizes to lower transportation costs (remember that bit for later).

All very worthy.

Trouble is, like virtually everything today, Paladone's brushes are manufactured in good ol' China, so Ms Mealia obviously thinks nothing of shipping them half way around the world on a ginormous container ship.

With a carbon footprint that big, no wonder she enlists the help of Mr Holdway to make the packaging a little more environmentally-friendly.