Of fake malls and burger smuggling Shop Talk

The past few weeks have brought about a fair amount of doom mongering and negative pondering from this column.

Mostly this has been geared towards the current economic decline, and how the lack of consumer spending and rapidly decreasing consumer confidence has really knocked the retailers for six.

As a result, instead of me bleating on about the woes of the industry, this week's column will concentrate on some of the more light-hearted news stories from the world of retail.

Firstly we can start with the news in China that the world's first 'fake' mall is to open soon. A better explanation would be to say that this is not actually a fake mall, but a mall that is being dedicated to the world of fake products.

The mall is to be built in Nanjing, which is east of the city of Shanghai, and would-be visitors can lavish themselves with all of today's modern conveniences and brands, although on a slightly more surreal level.

The next story moves to England, and believe it or not, has a link, albeit a tentative one to the previous one, but this time it is concerned with the real fast food brand and not the similarly monikered, but fake one above.

A prison officer has been suspended at Belmarsh high security prison in South East London for allegedly smuggling in meals and burgers for inmates. Although CCTV cameras are rife throughout the prison, as you would expect, there are still no clues as to how the food came about being in a cell, during inspection time. Apparently officers on duty smelt the food, which raised suspicion; they subsequently made an investigative search round the prison and found it hidden under a towel in a sink.

Lastly we move to a true-life case of death by shopping and the unfortunate story of a shop-a-holic from the UK who died when a mountain of unopened items collapsed on top of her. The woman in question had a seemingly insatiable appetite for buying quite literally anything and everything, and possessed a garage full of electrical items, a scarf collection that ran to nearly 300 and a car full of teddy bears, chocolate bars and cans of soda.

Whilst these stories provide us with a little light relief from the problems that the retail industry is currently facing, they do all have a common link, in that they demonstrate how wide-spread and far-reaching our demand for goods and produce has become. On that note, I think I might pop over to Nanjing and treat myself to some lunch at Pizza Huh&&

- The writer is Head of Retail Services, GRMC Advisory Services.