Freitag 08.04 - Samstag 09.04

Shareholder Perks & Benefits

 Various companies offer free perks such as discounts, vouchers, etc to their shareholders. The number of shares and formalities vary from company to company. I tried to find sources listing perks and requirements:

Travel-dealz.eu: Travel related Shareholder Perks

Barclays: Very comprehensive list, but mainly UK entities

Fidelity: Similar to Barclays UK

Finanzfluss.de: Includes some European (mainly German) companies [GERMAN]

Historical increase of prices in food within the last 10 years Follow-up

 At the beginning of March 2022 I tried to update the database for my article I wrote back in August 2020 on historical price increases.

Beginning March 2022 the values look like this:

I trimmed the data points more towards 10 yrs.

Overall price increase looks much higher now (3.93% vs. 2.29% in Aug 2020), with most of the increases coming from 2022.

This is for example how the data for Rapeseed cooking oil looks like:

 Notable as with most other products is the decrease in price from 2014-2018 and sharp increase in 2022.

After I updated by database Aldi (Germany's disounter with the biggest pricing power and pricing leader) that the will increase the prices of over 400 products (so basically everything they sell).

Looks like I will have to do a follow-up rather soon.

Emergency Preparedness / Recommendations: Food & Beverages 2

 Recently I noticed that the two big discount markets here in Germany (Aldi/Lidl) provide offers on cartons of staple canned foods. I would recommend such offers to purchase sufficient long lasting vegetables & fruits.

For reference purposes I attached the two offers, both starting next week (i.e. calendar week 5 of 2022).

Aldi Süd: 

Lidl: 

UPDATE ALDI SÜD STARTING 21. OCTOBER 2022

Emergency Preparedness / Recommendations: Food & Beverages

 Based on the official recommendations (see this Checklist) of German Ministry of Civil Protection.

Will Russia invade Ukraine

 Since autumn 2021 Russia again started a massive troop build-up near the border of Ukraine, deploying a troop of +100k, plus equipment. Talks between US and Russia hit dead end beginning of this week. 

As usual if in doubt it makes sense to create a little list of what speaks for (pro) or against (contra) a certain scenario (here: The invasion). I quickly want to mention that I do not possess additional sources beyond conventional mass media and any other insights, just an interested observer.

Motatos: Shopping Experience / Unpacking

 Today I received a package from Motatos, which arrived pretty much one week after the purchase order. Motatos is selling food and beverage close to or short past expiration date. I really like the idea and when still living in Berlin sometimes visited a store with the same concept (Sirplus, they are also online).

Last week I got a 20% off voucher for Motatos, which I did not know before and tried it out. Most of their stock seemed to consist of sweet and salty snacks and although they were offering staples such as canned food, pasta, etc. I found those offers not very attractive (price wise). They did have some interesting beverages (cheap fever tree), but I do not like ordering drinks online - petty the delivery guy.

This is how it looked when opened, very well packed nothing broken.

Contents were as follows, including the months the product has expired (-) or still to go on (+):

Unpacked:

Conclusion:

Not really convinced to be honest. Even with the discount and free shipping what I got for 32EUR is alright, but considering most is past (some quite a lot past) expiration nothing sensational. 

I guess ordering makes sense if they offer some products at a very good price which you really like and cannot get enough (so you get past the free shipping).