Budget UK clothing outlet at Alliance will create 20 jobs
Monday 17th August 2009, 11:30AM BST.
UP to 20 jobs will be created when Peacocks clothing comes to Alliance in October.
The development is part of plans to develop the shop as a department store.
Alliance managing director Andrew Bagot (pictured) said his company had responded to the economic climate by inviting the UK value chain, which he compared with retail giant Primark, to the island.
The new posts will include a senior manager and two full-time assistant managers.
‘We expect there to be around 20 new staff who will be employed by Peacocks but we will, of course, be working alongside them and are looking forward to welcoming them to our team,’ said Mr Bagot.
He said it was time Guernsey offered something more affordable.
‘The pricing is going to be very aggressive, very cheap. At a time when everyone is being careful with their money, this will give them an opportunity to buy something fashionable or to get their children a new outfit without a huge expense.
‘The island does not have a low-cost offering from the UK and we expect this to be very popular with our customers.’
He said it would fill a gap in the market and that the only comparable store had been Woolworths.
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Another great deal for Guernsey then….after the scandal of Primark employing child labour in creating its low cost creations, we now have Peacocks arriving (the company who repeatedly refuses to make submissions to the annual review by “Let’s Clena Up Fashion”. No wonder the clothes are cheap when they are paying children 13 pence a day!
Better to go to a car boot sale than support such practices.
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Belinda
As opposed to the finance houses that don’t contribute towards any misery anywhere?
Oh no, that’s right. They don’t. Any by-product of legal secrecy, say, investigative merry-go-rounds for tax authorities, is entirely consequential and unintentional. My mistake.
Clothes made by children? Legal in their country. So what’s the problem? Our poor moral compass hates the kiddies with blistered fingers, but when the spotlight falls on the equally immoral practice of encouraging tax avoidance (and so perpetuating conditions where companies will exploit poverty and poor education because of the lack of tax take, and probably corruption that turns whatever eye they can afford, to look elsewhere) then I get my posts censored.
I must sue someone for this discomfort in my life!
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I’m still having an internal argument about the child/slave labour issue in relation to the cheap goods we enjoy in our shops. Of course, I hate to be gaining at the cost of 12 year olds (and even younger) working 12 hour days in appalling conditions for a pittance. And then, I think, what if I don’t buy these products, will poor families dependent on these terrible jobs for their livelihoods be made destitute? Surely even a bad job is better than nothing?
I buy “fairtrade” goods when available but what should I do when they are not?
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Ted, if it helps, Peacocks use cheap illegal immigrant labour, paying well under the minimum market rate rather than child labour.
Probably best as well that you don’t read Unfair Trade by Marc Sidwell, which will explain exactly why you shouldn’t be buying fairtrade.
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Well, Student Bob, your first piece of info doesn’t make my decision any easier. Most immigrant labour in Guernsey, legal or not, is at the bottom end of the pay scale but it’s still advantageous for them to work in low grade jobs here rather than higher grade jobs at home.
I’m not sure whether you are saying that “fairtrade” is not what it seems and is actually more exploitative than non fairtrade. If this is the case, are firms like the Co-op decieving us?
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Peacocks is a well established UK Company, but why are they going to Alliance, instead of the town high street. Surely they would sell more clothes in town. Or is it that what everyone has been saying that the landlords rents are too high?
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Ted, Miss Student Bob advises me that the illegal immigrant produced clothing tends to wear better than the child labour produced alternatives. She says she’d always buy illegal immigrant when given the choice. She also feels that the immigrants have made a conscious choice to escape their home country and live and work in the UK so she’s okay with the ethics of the latest LBD. She did point out that child labour is better suited to shoes and handbags as their little hands can fit inside confined spaces.
Fairtrade, basically, isn’t the saviour everyone thinks, at best it creates a two-tier structure in the farming communities, where fairtrade farms are significantly richer than non-fairtrade, wich affects supply of employment, disease, food and water etc. At worst, it’s a cynical ploy of the retailers who add a ‘fairtrade premium’ to their products of which less than 10% ever makes it out of the retailers profit and loss account. Personally, I avoid fairtrade and buy local or ethically sourced products.
Mal – I’m at uni in the north of England, even in this poverty stricken hell-hole Peacocks is an out-of-town retail park type of store. At the risk of being pretentious, it doesn’t have a high street ‘image’.
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Hurray for Mr Bagot for once again championing the consumer ! Alliance continues to show that it is listening to their customers and stocking products that they want and need at a fair price. No wonder other stores where corporate greed lives on, aren’t happy.
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Sarah :- ” No wonder other stores where corporate greed lives on, aren’t happy.”
Errrr you sure you’re championing the right side with this one?
The bargain basement end of the rag-trade – the stack ‘em high, flog it cheap brigade – are amongst the very worst examples of corporate greed around. The whole business model is both ethically flawed and highly exploitative. From the factory workers, whether they are based in Britain or otherwise, that have appalling pay and conditions to the end consumer that seduced by low prices is convinced that cheap throwaway garments are a desirable product. Everyone is a loser. Except the factory owner, the wholesaler and end retailer of course.
Here’s a fun game for a sunny day!
Have you ever used a sewing machine?
Try and make a pair of jeans, see how long it takes you, then ask yourself how brands like Peacocks can sell them for £10. For the full sweatshop experience whilst you’re trying to get the double stitching on the seams j u s t right, try turning the heating up to 50C and get a friend to hit you with a stick if you make any mistakes.
Let me know how you get on.
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sarah
a fair price you say?
wow yeah i bet the poor soul who slugged their guts out all day in a very poor conditions earned a bowl of rice out of that. is it still fair?
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To bcb and MrsPinthepantry
1.Yes- in my opinion,Alliance sells for a fair price to the consumers of Guernsey.
2.Do I agree with sweat shops ?No,of course not but I fail to be convinced that many other retailers in Guernsey do not exploit the poor too yet charge higher prices.Is it fair that “a poor soul earned a bowl of rice” – no but a)look at Ted’s comments and b) it’s not fair that there are many inhabitants of Guernsey on very low wages who cannot afford the high prices of other stores.I suppose they could just get their sewing machine out….
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Do we not already have this in the form of Sports Direct? More chav supply for the increasing chav demand. Still Am I bov’d!
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Hi Sarah darling.
Your points:-
1 – Alliance sells at a price no more or less ‘fair’ than other Guernsey retailers. It may be cheaper but it’s for a reason. It’s a poorly lit, drafty warehouse with the no attention paid to interior design at all! Suits some people. The other supermarkets spend more on the shopping experience, so the prices are higher, simples! A well known corner shop on the out skirts of Town has set prices so high they are in danger of skewing the European inflation figures all by themselves, but there you are paying for the shop being being staffed well before and well after anywhere else.
It’s called price discovery and as long as there’s choice it’s all pretty groovy actually, no one establishment is more ‘greedy’ than the others, they’re just different.
2 – So it’s OK that “a poor soul earned a bowl of rice” because there are poor over here too? I agree that not everyone has the luxury of living in places like the P’s Mansion but in comparison with the poverty and misery elsewhere in the world we’re not even trying! Unfortunately there is a direct relationship between the pressure that the West puts other countries under to produce cheaper and cheaper goods and their workforce being kept in abject poverty.
I brought it up for a completely different reason but if you can’t afford decent clothes why not get the sewing machine out? It’s what Mr & Mrs P Snr did when I was younger and actually they still do. Better to mend and make do than head into Chav central and do battle with the trackie bottomed hoodies.
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MrsPinthepantry
does the P stand for patronising?
just wondered :)
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Hi sppsarnia!
Which particular bit do you find patronising?
You don’t like the basic fact that different stores cater for different customers and price points?
Maybe you find my dear old folks fixing things when they wear out threatening to your £3 T-shirt way of life?
Or do you disagree with my very brief and over simplified summary of the West’s exploitation of third world countries?
Do tell as I’m dying to know.
BTW Is your psdeudo-jingoistic name an acronym for “Serious Peculiar Permanent Synaesthesia with Authoritarian Raising Nonsensical Irony Affliction?”
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oh dear this discussion will rumble on as it has for past years and many to come no doubt.
I have experience of the ‘sweat shop’ and for that reason will not knowingly (and I stress knowlingly)purchase something made in these conditions. One person commented that if they stopped buying these items would that mean the person would lose their job albeit badly paid – that is of course a real and valid concern.
The real problem is that in truth non of us can be absolutely sure where and how our clothes are made unless of course we make our own. It is realistic to say that if you purchase clothing such as a teeshirt with hand sewn sparkles on and you pay less than £10 the chances are it will be made in a sweatshop. The same goes for a pair of Jeans that costs under £10
I have opened a workshop in a 3rd world country to give the people jobs – we pay a fair wage for a fair days work – give our staff breakfast and give them holiday and sickness entitlement. None of them could believe that we were prepared to do this. I truly feel they should be treated with the respect they deserve – after all they are human beings and are no better or worse than you or I. I also believe that we should lead by example. What we do in our workshop will not change the world, but it does show that it is possible to produce quality goods however the customer must pay a decent price for those goods too, and to date all our customers understand that and that’s why they buy from us.
It is a given that most customers generally want goods at the cheapest prices they can get however I am experiencing a real shift of thinking on that subject.
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MrsPinthepantry
I don’t disagree with any of your comments, just the tone in which they were delivered, the ‘Sarah darling’ comment was particularly sickly. Obviously you are a very clever lady using all those big words! By the way my name represents the parish I live in and Sarnia is the name of my Island.
Carry on love, you are very entertaining. Now how’s that for patronising?
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Mrs. P. I don;t think he,she meant to say you were patronising…I think he/she meant pedantic.
Also look up quasi!
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there will always be a country that can produce goods for a lower price. where do you think ipods are made? all the lcd tv sets? do you really think that because you pay more for an item, it will be better for the underpaid. no. you are just wasting your own money and giving it to the retailer as pure profit. most of the biggest companies use cheap labour. always have and always will.
take a handmade silk tie for example…£25 + in the local shops. how much do you think it cost the shop to buy in? £2.50 would be a good starting figure. that £2.50 includes delivery to guernsey. total profit on a silk tie = £22.50 +…minus rent and wages etc. at the end of the day, if you want to help underpaid workers, just buy 3 or 4 cheaper silk ties. they all come from the same places.
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sppsarnia
I don’t disagree with any of your comments, just the tone in which they were delivered, the ‘Sarah
Thats nothing, the old trout sent me a kiss, :( haha
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Sorry guys and gals but have any of you been in a peacocks?
I don’t think this store will do too much here?
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You all make me laugh..CAN YOU HEAR YOURSELVES??
And I bet every single one of you will be in peacocks some time or another, because it is cheap, and we all need clothes..
Go on go have a look, I dare you!!!
Xmas is on the way, and an ideal place to GO TO BUY those stocking fillers.
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Hi mandy darling, well I can certainly hear YOU with all that SHOUTING! Or maybe it’s just that your CAPS LOCK key is broken? If so just say and I’ll send my handy man round to fix it, his rates are very reasonable.
Anyway you’ve lost your bet already dearest I’m afraid, I won’t be in Peacocks ever because I’m not a hypocrite. Simples.
I’m not the only one either.
If you don’t have a conscience, great! Shop till you drop, but don’t make the mistake of believing that everyone is like you.
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