Why Raubex is ditching mining. Plus: Me&B hits retail gold

It's losing market share, you know. Check is the usual big contender. But my theory, not supported by anything, is that Pantry by Marble is starting to butt. You know, I think rich people get bored easily. And Wolves has had a long run. And I mean, you recently had Greg Solomon on your show, former McDonald's CEO. He's now running Pantry. It looks like it's part of a big push that's opened a couple of new high-end stores. They're planning more. So, yeah, we'll have to see.

I mean, Woolly's is phenomenal, truly an exceptional retail experience, but the ranges are fairly limited and repetitive. And as you say, shoppers get bored. We've got lots of money. We'll take it to wherever the new shiny things are. Speaking of shiny new things, Virgin Active is going more and more up market. That's upsetting quite a lot of their traditional customer base. Is it paying off? It's, I guess, too early to say at the moment, it doesn't look like it. Their gym membership fell about 4% to 605,000 people.

Six months to end September. And I think they may find some more pressure in coming months, judging from the outcry that there's been, they've changed recently, changed the membership perks, and it's now much tougher to get a smoothie. We've been covering this development. Yeah, they also saw a fallen membership in the UK. They announced this week that they're buying a German gym group for 2.5 billion rand, 13 high-end clubs. You know, I guess this absolutely must work out.

Long ago, Virgin Active had to launch a rights issue of 3.8 billion rand just to settle its debt. The plan is to ultimately list Virgin Active, but it doesn't look like that's going to happen anytime soon. What about MTN and Vodacom, the 21st-century utility versions of old water and power companies? They're quite dull nowadays, but they're essential backbone to our everyday lives. Yes, they bus reported results this week. MTN's total subscribers up more.