Out pals at InBev have completed a £35bn (gulp) takeover of USA brewer Anheuser-Busch to create the world’s largest brewer. And the new catchy name? Anheuser-Busch InBev, which sounds like an Austrian football team, or toilet disease. They’ll sell 46 billion litres of beer a year, putting the following brands under one roof: Stella, Budweiser, Beck’s, Hoegaarden, Leffe, Brahma, Staropramen, Michelob, Rolling Rock. It has upset patriotic American politicians that their appalling beers should be owned by a Belgium firm, but they’ll get over it. Few job losses are expected, growth is on the cards, particularly for brand Budweiser, whose performance in Europe compared to the rest of the Western world has been relatively weak. Like the piss-awful beer itself.

Today’s papers are all claiming that “the fizz” has dropped out of Majestic Wine as its profits have fallen by 25% on last year as champagne sales have fallen by a fifth. No great surprise: people don’t have that much to celebrate right now. But you’d be wrong if you read the headlines and wrote Majestic off: you must remember that some of these new profit figures that companies are reporting are down on last year, but that’s just because last year (and the few proceeding it) were so ridiculously good. The fact we’ve  run into Majestic recruiting at the Reading Uni Graduate Fair and the Brighton Uni Placements Fair: as far as they’re concerned, its business as usual. With well over £5m in profits to play with. Retail is facing a tough Christmas: The British Retail Consortium has revealed that October was the worst month for retailers since April 2005, with total retail sales down by (shock horror) 0.1%! Tim Clifford, a retail partner at KPMG, said: “In non-food, it is going to be some of the toughest trading that has been seen in the last 20 years.” Thanks Tim! I remember 1988 and it was alright as I recall.

Sainsbury’s staff are to be offered formal qualifications in stock-taking and store working as well as basic maths and English literacy skills - equivalent to five good GCSEs. It will also offer web-based courses in basic maths and English, equivalent to a GCSE grade D, to staff who need them. The basic skills courses are designed to let staff progress at their own pace and will use questions set in a retail context such as pricing and weights.  The government wants more employers to offer skills training courses. McDonalds, airline Flybe and Network Rail, were the first firms to be approved to offer the in-house courses. Try something new today…?!

As my son’s libelous illustration shows, students can be somewhat ambivalent about Nestle thanks to their marketing of baby formula to developing companies back in 1977. No getting away from the fact that they are the world’s biggest food group, and it is precisely that global spread that means they have reported a significant rise in sales. The maker of KitKats, Perrier waters and Nespresso coffee, is enjoying the strength of its mother home’s Swiss Franc while the rest of our currencies fall like spat conkers. Strength in the food and drink is something to take note of right now…but will your conscience let you…? Of course it will!

The economy may be flat, but good old Britvic, the soft drinks firm, saw sales bubble up (I thank you) nearly 30% boosted by strong sales of Drench, Gatorade and Fruit Shoot juices. The firm says its marketing has paid off – particularly in-store displays and promotions – so put that in your portfolio. The firm markets Drench and Gatorade under license from the brands’ owner, PepsiCo, who incidentally have seen ditch water flavoured results. The vast majority of growth for Britvic came in shop sales, rather than their drinks in pubs, which saw sales fall sharply. Worrying times for the Great British Pub – not that I condone going to the pub to drink orange juice unless you’ve lost your driving license – but any money in the till is a relief to today’s landlords and ladies.