A bitter taste

IT is known worldwide as the mint with the hole. But it is also the mint with a giant hole in its global distribution arrangements.

By The Newsroom

Published 1st Sep 2010, 23:31 BST

Updated 1st Sep 2010, 23:32 BST

For, while Polo mints have become a sweet part of York's fabric since they first rolled off Rowntree's production line in the city in 1948, it appears that it is cheaper for a nearby Poundland store to import the mints from 7,300 miles away in Indonesia.

It's even more absurd than the admission this week that Ginsters' pasties are sent on a 250-mile round trip before they can be sold at the supermarket next to their production base in Cornwall.

Poundland say they have done nothing wrong and that this absurd arrangement was more cost-effective from its perspective. That maybe

so. But, in these environmentally-conscious times, this failure to support a local institution leaves a bitter taste.