Business Diary: Pancakes are too expensive to drop

If you can't afford to toss quite so many pancakes today, you know whom to blame – like everything else, it is the fault of the bankers, of course. The cost of many staple foods has risen very sharply in recent months – the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation says food prices are now at a record high – and one reason for this is market speculators have caused a bubble to develop, claims the World Development Movement, the anti-poverty campaigner. Try not to drop them.

Lord Green waves his magic wand

In these difficult times for trade ambassadors, it's good to see a bit of gratitude from exporters benefiting from the services of those who thanklessly have to hawk the UK's wares around the world. The Wand Company, which got thousands from the Dragons' Den panel last year for its button-less remote control, says it has Trade minister Lord Green to thank for its launch into Spain. He's helped it to get a distribution deal for the "Kymera" wand – you flick your wrist and it changes channels for you – in the country.

The lonely world of online trade

Our heart goes out to them. Four in 10 British businesses have websites that attract no visitors at all – not a single one – according to a survey published today by ClixSense. That is truly tragic: these poor, lonely souls go to all the trouble of trying to exploit the modern world and then nobody bothers to visit.

Money is the new rock'n'roll

So what's your next career move after quitting as the bassist of one of the world's biggest rock groups? Well, for Duff McKagan, once of Guns N' Roses, the obvious step (to him anyway) was to launch a wealth-management business – and now Meridian Rock is going global. McKagan admits he knew nothing about money until 1994, when he started looking at his former band's financial records during some time off sick. Having realised he couldn't make any sense of them, he took some finance classes, became ever more interested, and eventually ended up advising other musicians on what to do with their cash. Now he's turning professional, going into business with former banker Andy Bottomley.

businessdiary@independent.co.uk