Member Info for Fountains

Hi St.Ives, the threshold for a TR1 (notifiable holding) is 3% so I don't think there's anything untoward to worry about with that at least.

In fairness, yes there was a time when it wasn't slowly, slowly. When the stock shot up over £1 it was far from "slowly" as there were massive announcements coming out about progress on store count and big deals. Well, it turned out that none of that materialised. Rampy hot air.

I would hardly call those latest announcements bubble wrap. They're not going to announce 60 stores and a bog standard order to ramp up a frenzy. It shows methodical progress on a realistic strategy, the kind that all businesses need.

Thanks St.Ives. Let's hope that they get this figured out quickly as relisting/readmission is a very time consuming and costly process.

Averaging down here too, hopefully not just chasing losses!

Good article yesterday: https://www.swlondoner.co.uk/life/13122022-podcasts-are-more-popular-than-ever-heres-why

AM this is a useful update thank you.

One question I still have is as St.Ives commented a while back:

"Will the new listing be treated as a new applicant to the LSE? If so, would the new rules around MMC (£30m) for main market listings come into play? I read this.. “the requirement (£30m)only applies when the company is first listed, or on re-listing after a reverse takeover”"

So from point 3 and 5 of your post, do you see us getting to that magic 30m? If we don't get it could that mean suspension? And since the merger (which for the record I think is a good thing) is already very dilutive, do you think we can expect to be watered down further with a bumper placing to reach the required level?

Not ramping or deramping just trying to see where we stand. Hopefully we can all do well here.

That's not quite what he said. CS referred to both CBD and the "botanical" nicotine free vapes that you mention.

The nicotine versus nicotine free point was not missed in the interview. As he said, the fact of the matter is that a lot of the people who use vapes do not do so because they're trying to quit cigarettes or nicotine but instead because they enjoy the taste and sensation of vaping. That seems especially true with millennials and the younger demographic.

The alcohol free beverage market is a very interesting parallel here. Look at Seedlip and other 0% alcohol adult drinks that have really blown up over the past several years. You'll even find most if not all of the major breweries and alcohol companies making their own alcohol free / low alcohol beverages.

It looks like some of the big tobacco players are already eying up the nicotine free space. BAT sells VUSE e-cigarettes for example. Their website allows customers to "Choose 0mg for a nicotine-free option". They wouldn't offer that if they thought it wouldn't be popular or profitable. Elf Bar are also offering lots of nicotine free options and I think we can all agree that they've become huge with a presence in corner shops, post offices etc. etc.

This looks to be a good decision by Chill. Yes, I'm excited to see the CBD vapes and think that offers an edge, but I wouldn't be so quick to write off a nicotine-free vape especially sold under their new branding.

Thanks for your response. Important to remember/account for the fact that Chill won't be selling packs of its products at the list price you see whatever that is e.g. $10 as you say. That's the price for customers and there will be an adjustment for other steps in the chain. The retailer wants to take a cut and so on.

I'm not suggesting that revenues have been all that great but just another factor to consider. FWIW it seems the online consensus is that vapes are high margin products. I hope and believe they'll be able to sell them in greater quantities.

Maybe you should pay more attention Vas.

As you say BettermentRS operates the 'feel good shop' programme in convenience stores. That includes Yesway and Allsups. If you read the AGM Statement of 29 September 2022 you'll see it refers to "363 branches of Yesway/Allsup's". That's 20 more than the announcement your dragging up. Clearly it must still be doing OK to still be in the stores and have been added to more.

As for the cowboy and the soccer tournament, it's pretty obvious it wasn't working. The new CEO has said as much and clearly stopped spending on that and not a moment too soon.

Oh and PS. I'm told by a source worth listening to that TAAT products are definitely NOT legal in the UK whatever you may believe. So enjoy that tat while you still can.

It seems to me that you're here to have an argument regardless of what they do. You rightly complain and criticise that they've not sold enough of their CBD products, but then you still complain when they take steps to sell more of them. You even complain when they expand into other products - so what is it that you'd have them do then?

Everyone agrees that the last two years were a missed opportunity but what's the point in saying that. There's still a lot of opportunity to come and I think Chill will work out in the end.

Sorry Vas but I’m failing to see the irony. Callum has said before multiple times that he thinks Chill should expand outside of CBD. The impression I got was that some vapes would be CBD and others might not be. I don’t understand why you think that’s a bad thing for Chill or the new site. It’s a brand and they’re doing what they can to grow it .

The recycling is really encouraging. Not enough people doing it so we really do have a first mover advantage in what will be a huge industry as EVs spread through the market.

God forbid a CEO should get his hands dirty. Looks like a trade event, totally normal for him to be there and encouraging IMO. Better than being sat in an ivory tower with no involvement in the real business…

The best they could hope for is somebody buying the rights to use the brand and do something fresh with it. It would be hard to fix a loss making retail chain when you're bloated on shop rental fees and other huge costs.

Don't forget that Chill basically rebranded when they relaunched their new website. There's none of the old cowboy stuff any more. Followers don't show up overnight unless you buy them. They already announced that they brought on one of the top SEO agencies to improve search engine ranking and that takes time too. IMO there has been a lot of mess to clean up but it looks like they're getting on with it.

This is a really good sign. If they manage to repeat that weekly performance they’d be up to $520k revenue Chill.com. Before almost all of Chill’s revenue was from convenience stores and now we also have an effective online plus dispensaries and new products coming.

Got mine this morning so very speedy delivery! No problems with my order, 2x variety packs and a carton of smokes. Hope they get yours sorted out for you.

Beyond any doubt that the co is being discussed regularly by mngmt of Spotify/Apple Music etc. The fact that it allows creators to push out their media to the whole run of major outlets makes it attractive back end tech even before you add the users, revenue etc into the equation.

Try telling that to Fitbit, Gymshark, Lindt, Kylie Cosmetics... thelist goes on. All that matters is if it appeals to customers and leads to sales.