The Capitalist: Farmers protest heats up; Guardian strikes; Jaguar’s rebrand

The farmers protest escalates, Guardian hacks threaten strikes and more; catch up on the latest City gossip in this week’s edition of The Capitalist

THE TORTOISE AND THE MARE

The faith of The Guardian leadership that unions are “good for capitalism” may be in doubt after news yesterday that journalists at the leftwing paper are due to go on strike, after voting overwhelmingly (93 per cent) in favour of industrial action in an NUJ ballot. The dispute comes in response to The Guardian’s proposed sale of its Sunday title The Observer to Tortoise Media, a startup set up in 2018 to champion “slow news” that is yet to turn a profit.

What strike action at The Guardian will look like is yet to be seen, though perhaps inspiration will be taken from their progressive cousins across the pond, The New York Times, where tech staff earlier this month carried out an eight-day strike and – more devastating for some – NYT Games boycott over the US election. The workers have since returned to the negotiating table, where pet bereavement leave, a four-day work week and a ban on scented products in break rooms are among their demands to be discussed.

FARMERS PROTEST ESCALATES

Farmers certainly took the fight to Westminster at their protest this week, but not quite to the extent advertised by Sky News, whose video reel mixup (pictured) suggested quite the escalation of affairs. Explaining the planned protest over Labour’s changes to inheritance tax on farms, a Sky News reader described the growing anger of UK farmers as visuals of launching missiles lit up the screen. Woopsie.

Not to worry, the news outlet’s blushes were more than made up for by the hilarity it brought to viewers. “They can’t pay the inheritance tax but they can afford ballistic missiles??” one user commented on X, while another commended the farmers for doing “what it takes”.

SQUARE MILE STOCKING FILLER

The ultimate City boy stocking filler? James Bond socks from The London Sock Exchange, of course, the Square Mile’s dedicated sock sartorialists. “We used to joke that with our socks on, you can expect your footsie to experience significant outperformance,” co-founder Dan Zell told The Capitalist, while wearing a rather fetching pair of avocado socks. “Not *quite* so relevant these days, but we still like to think we’re leading the way on sock-market trends.” Zell’s much more serious business partner works in Financial Services and wasn’t available for comments about socks.

PARTYING WITH FARMER J

The City’s salad cult has been much discussed in the pages of this newspaper, not least due to its own journalists’ proclivity to part with their own hard-earned cash for a glorious bowl of overpriced kale for a premium al desko lunch. So an invitation to the launch party of Farmer J’s newest location in Holborn was simply an offer The Capitalist couldn’t refuse. And we weren’t disappointed. Live DJs, a free-flowing bar and – most importantly – an abundance of harissa chicken, miso tofu and tahini tiramisu made for the kind of party usually only found in the metropolitan dreams of Square Mile commuters. Even better news, there’s more to come, with Farmer J co-founder (or “farmer’s wife,” as self-introduced) Ali Recanti telling The Capitalist there are already eight more UK stores in the pipeline for 2025, and even one in the States.

LUXURY AND THE SQUARE MILE? NO THANKS

If you thought the Royal Exchange’s jewellery stores and the watches on display over power lunches at The Ned were a symbol of the Square Mile’s love for the finer things in life, you’ll be surprised to learn that the capital didn’t even make it into the top 10 cities ranked by their love for luxury items. Number one on the list, compiled by the Cases.gg website?, was in fact the unassuming Blackpool, followed by Worcester and Reading. The company analysed over 120 search terms related to luxury items, such as best luxury cars 2024, affordable luxury watch brands and best designer clothing brands, to identify cities where luxury is most sought after. Turns out we’re a humble bunch after all.

RIDE THE GRAVY YACHT

Britain’s super rich may want to think twice about leaving this august country: Lidl this Christmas have ousted the traditional gravy boat to instead launch a flotilla of exclusive super-sized “gravy yachts” (and even more exclusive “gravy super-yachts”) able to hold up to five litres of the hallowed Yorkshire pud emollient. The supermarket cited gravy revenues last Christmas for the launch, with gravy sales peaking at one unit sold per second on the 22nd December last year, proving the demand for greater helpings of the liquid gold.

THREE CHEERS FOR M RESTAURANT

City stalwart M Restaurant raised a glass to their tenth anniversary on Monday – as runner and longtime City AM friend Martin Williams announced he was stepping away from the business. Our most serious and revered execs have been known to dance the night away at M Restaurant for leaving dos, Christmas parties, and to welcome to the City back when this newspaper joined arms with Williams to encourage the City’s return post-Covid. We wish you all the best, Martin, and look forward to returning to M for many more steaks.

GLASTONBURY MISERY

If you woke to the sight of two terrible little green bars on your laptop screen on Sunday morning, you weren’t alone. It was the Glastonbury ticket sale and a new mechanism by the website SeeTickets promised fairness in allocation, but still 2.5m were vying for just over 138,000 tickets, so the chances weren’t great. Cue Linkedin influencers, who’ve taken to the business networking platform to flog VIP experiences to hacked-off financiers that missed out. Prices aren’t listed but tickets sold in this way typically go for thousands. “I’m still traumatised from those green bars,” commented one networking event organiser. Never has trudging around a muddy field felt so exclusive.

CATFIGHT

Does anyone ever take well to a rebrand? Very rarely, but it’s fair to say the unveiling of Jaguar’s new look – in a video featuring various strutting models but not a single car – went down like a lead balloon with fans of the brand this week. Our sympathies with their social media manager, whose response to the cold reception certainly opted for fight over flight. “This is surely a joke,” one X-user xeeted; “A pivotal moment,” Jaguar’s official account corrected. “Just give us supercharged v8s and a new XJ that looks like the classic. Not this s***,” another, more colourful user protested. “Thanks for the feedback! We’ll be sure to pass it onto the team,” Jaguar replied. 

Its boldest punt, a response to Elon Musk, who left a comment under the video asking “Do you sell cars?”, to which the carmaker responded with an invite for “a cuppa in Miami on 2nd December” to the eccentric billionaire.