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Bibby Line, the owner of Costcutter, is a 206 year old family-owned company and its non-executive chairman Simon Sherrard recently wrote to the FT in response to a column on unforced errors made by entrepreneurs. "We manage our business for cash and not for profit as we have nowhere to turn if the cash runs out," he wrote. "We have coined the phrase that you can often have cashless profit but you very rarely have profitless cash." My friend David Adams challenged me as to how many retailers understand this rule. His view was that it would be close to 100 per cent. I am not sure that he is correct. How do you rate your skills in this respect? The second thought comes from Bibby's website and its observations on the strengths of Costcutter, which it says delivers the best advice to its retail partners plus a national brand, marketing and store development support. "Arguably, these together generate the highest profit margins in the sector....

Rumours of a tie-up between Palmer & Harvey and Costcutter had been circulating in the industry for more than a year and the logic of the alliance is explained in a short marketing booklet. Together they have set up a not-for-profit Buyco to negotiate the best possible terms. The duo are promising existing customers even better prices than ever before. Will this happen? There is a good chance if the new retail arm can organise its disciplines and demonstrate that it is creating new purchase opportunities for suppliers. What independent retailers have to be realistic about is that Tesco has a six per cent margin advantage because it controls around a third of the market. Simply lumping all their invoices together does not create the value, working collaboratively to meet shopper needs does. P&H has handed over all its symbol group convenience operations to Costcutter as part of this deal. Thus its Mace and SuperShop members will be managed by the team at Costcutter. P...

This photograph from Malcolms Stores, a Costcutter shop in Tile Hill, Coventry, shows how strong a soft drinks display can be - complete with meal deals covering breakfast and lunch. Enjoy the attention to detail and the adjacencies.

It is a tricky business to keep on top of what the numbers of stores belonging to each symbol group mean. At one level, it could mean that head offices are able to negotiate better deals because they have more shops taking part in promotions. At another, it could mean that more local retailers are choosing one group over another as it is delivering more to their bottom lines. It could be fashion. It could be an exercise in badging for vanity. However, now that the IGD has updated its annual figures, Booker's Premier symbol group has overtaken Spar UK to top the chart with a 15.9 per cent of outlet numbers versus 15.7 per cent. Bestway takes third spot with a Best-one/Best-in share of 13.8 per cent, followed by Lifestyle from Landmark at 12.9 per cent. Londis has dropped to an 11.0 per cent share and Costcutter to a 9.5 per cent share. Mace has grown to a 5.3 per cent share and Nisa to a 4.8 per cent share. Overall, there are 16,288 symbol group stores, up 2.9 per cent on the ...

Taking part is the sign of a good retailer, analysis by Menzies Distribution claims and Paul Cheema, who runs a Costcutter in Coventry learned lots from teaming up with Heineken in the ACS's store challenge. He was persuaded to remerchandise his beer, cider and ale range and to promote a big night in deal with pizzas selling alongside lager. Mr Cheema says he delisted lines to bring in new products and changed the flow from cider, ale, lager to ale, cider, lager. This helped him grow ale and cider sales by 8.2 per cent and 31.6 per cent respectively year on year. Selling two pizzas and eight cans of lager for £10 was a big success. He also used in-store tastings to generate theatre. As a result of working with Heineken, Mr Cheema says he has been able to do similar work with other suppliers. For example, working with Cadbury has increased his confectionery sales by 9 per cent. Using supplier insight works. It is simple, low cost and easy to follow.