Harry Wallop

🍅Britain is in a cost of living crisis. 50+% of food we buy in supermarkets is now own-label. Tinned tomatoes cost just 43p in supermarkets. So...how on earth has Mutti – costing £1.60 – become the UK no1 tinned tomato brand? I went to Parma to find out... 🧵1/6

Mutti costs £1.60. But 65% of sales in UK are on discount – "Drive & Trial" a tactic used by premium brands to persuade shoppers to trade up. Shoppers are trading down from eating out. And splashing out on "affordable luxury" at home. Hence Mutti, Bold Bean, Ortiz are all going great guns📈 🧵5/6

🍅Britain is in a cost of living crisis. 50+% of food we buy in supermarkets is now own-label. Tinned tomatoes cost just 43p in supermarkets. So...how on earth has Mutti – costing £1.60 – become the UK no1 tinned tomato brand? I went to Parma to find out... 🧵1/6

🏆Farmers compete to win the annual Mutti “little golden tomato” for tomatoes with best ph levels/sugar/lycopene etc The trophy comes with cash. Up to €50,000. Farmers are incentivised to invest in soil, the quality of the veg etc. But there's another reason why they taste different... 🧵3/6

🍅Britain is in a cost of living crisis. 50+% of food we buy in supermarkets is now own-label. Tinned tomatoes cost just 43p in supermarkets. So...how on earth has Mutti – costing £1.60 – become the UK no1 tinned tomato brand? I went to Parma to find out... 🧵1/6

I wrote about ‘picky bits’. And the puerility of our age, how great advertising copywriting is no longer possible. And my begrudging admiration for M&S…

Always lovely to make front cover of Sunday Times Magazine. Especially for a piece I’ve wanted to write for ages – after a friend told me “Mum’s still stuck in the garage”, two years after the funeral. 🧵1/4

⚱️But along with all that ash we often leave dilemmas for those left with them. What to do? Turn it into jewellery, send them up in a drone, or leave them in a cupboard under the stairs? An estimated 300,000 remain uncollected in funeral homes. 🧵3/4

Always lovely to make front cover of Sunday Times Magazine. Especially for a piece I’ve wanted to write for ages – after a friend told me “Mum’s still stuck in the garage”, two years after the funeral. 🧵1/4

Do you really need a high protein scotch egg? Or high protein bagels or pasta? I’ve taken a look at how food companies are adding pea protein & wheat protein to food. And the prices they are charging…🧐

I have, however, tried Lidl’s “high protein beef mince”. It was rubbery…

Do you really need a high protein scotch egg? Or high protein bagels or pasta? I’ve taken a look at how food companies are adding pea protein & wheat protein to food. And the prices they are charging…🧐

🛒 Do Tories shop at M&S? And Greens at the Co-op & Lidl? And is Iceland a Restore hotbed? Fun data: supermarket shoppers / voters from More in Common. Is it wonky? Or a reflection on how everything has become fragmented. In politics and supermarket shopping? 🧵1/2

The secret to Rick Stein’s success is that viewers intuit that he’s someone they’d like to share a bottle of wine with. I discovered this to my joy – and cost – after he plied me with lots of v good white burgundy. The night before I was due to interview him at 8am…

He was as perky as a pilchard after 7am swim in Padstow harbour. I had a sore head. But we still managed to discuss his DJ’ing, feeling a failure, how tough it is running a restaurant, death, life, and family. And a range of seafood ready meals he’s created for Waitrose

🏢🤫Over the last 50 years offices have become half as noisy. No one talks any more. Or if they do it's in a sound-proof video conferencing booth to a colleague working from home. Is hot desking to blame? Or Slack? This week's @thetimes.com biz column...

Is hot-desking partly to blame for a surge in workplace loneliness? A survey suggests: - 17% people go all day without speaking to anyone in the office -37% say they have no close friends at work - 40% admit to feeling lonely Would love to hear your thoughts on a) is this true b) who's to blame...

How Nick Candy sold London's most expensive house. And helped the buyer avoid £18.5m in tax. Buy selling him *extra* houses. Another great bit of journalism from the ever-interesting @londoncentric.media (with number crunching from @danneidle.bsky.social & team)

Times births this morning. A future Marquess of Camden…

🐓 This is v. rare picture of a British housewife c1955 with roast chicken. Why’s it rare? Because in 1950s hardly anyone ate chicken – consumed by less than 1% of the UK. We slaughtered 1m birds a year. Now? We slaughter 1.1 billion. And it’s the most popular meat. By far 🧵1/6

🇹🇭🇨🇳This means that we are now importing lots of chicken meat to keep up with demand. Many supermarket 🍗 sandwiches are made with Thai or Chinese🐓. We used to be 96% self-sufficient in chicken. It’s now c60% 🧵5/6

🐓 This is v. rare picture of a British housewife c1955 with roast chicken. Why’s it rare? Because in 1950s hardly anyone ate chicken – consumed by less than 1% of the UK. We slaughtered 1m birds a year. Now? We slaughter 1.1 billion. And it’s the most popular meat. By far 🧵1/6

🐓 is cheap because farmers cross-bred varieties to create a large plump bird which goes from 🐣 to 🍗 in just 35 days. It is astonishingly efficient form of protein. But…this has led to welfare concerns. Farmers/supermarkets in response have done something crucial… 🧵3/6

🐓 This is v. rare picture of a British housewife c1955 with roast chicken. Why’s it rare? Because in 1950s hardly anyone ate chicken – consumed by less than 1% of the UK. We slaughtered 1m birds a year. Now? We slaughter 1.1 billion. And it’s the most popular meat. By far 🧵1/6

This was voted “front page of the century” by @britishlibrary.bsky.social Other UK front pages went for stark images on 9/11 – axing all words (unusual in those days). But @telegraph.co.uk knew well that a few written, sparse words matter. The very first draft of history.