I was told there was barely concealed glee among Thomas Cook and Co-op head honchos at the announcement of the Competition Commission’s decision on the retail merger.
Indeed, the fact that the deal was given the go-ahead with no conditions whatsoever was met with a sense of incredulity.
Most industry observers had expected the commission to demand about 70 shop disposals, with any figure significantly higher than that expected to have put the deal in jeopardy.
It does make you wonder how it can take the best part of a year to come to this conclusion, something that the architects of this deal must also be pondering.
Now, a lot of our readers are hopefully breathing a sigh of relief as Manny’s promise of limited job losses, despite branch closures, provides some much-needed good news.
Consolidation on this scale is always going to prompt change and with change there are always winner and losers, but I look forward to this joint venture bedding down quickly.
The team now has to appoint a board under a new chief executive and we look forward to hearing more about that soon.
Our website has been enjoying an incredible period recently, with record numbers of visits and pageviews in what is traditionally a quiet period.
Sadly, this is in part down to negative news stories such as the failure of Gill’s Cruise Centre and Cook’s profit warning.
I know the press is always accused of highlighting bad news and ignoring good news, so hopefully this week’s print magazine goes some way to redressing the balance.