We all know a coffee shop, a restaurant, a greasy spoon, a pub or a fine dining eatery that has closed in the last few months. But why, after two years of forced closures because of the coronavirus pandemic, are hospitality businesses closing now? Leanna Byrne speaks to hospitality business owners from three different countries to find out how they’re covering their overheads. Alessandro Borghese is a chef who owns restaurants in Milan and in Venice. He says he’s paying more for everything from food to oils and staff. And Mandla Mataure is the managing director for the Chimanimani Hotel in Manicaland in eastern Zimbabwe. Zimbabwe ended 2023 reporting a 244% inflation rate. How does Mandla deal with constant price rises when staff are looking for more money? Oliver Mansaray owns the restaurant, Kink, in Berlin. Oliver opened his first ever hospitality business right before the pandemic struck. Like Mandla, he’s taken on the cost of living challenge by cutting costs elsewhere and trying to be more efficient. Presenter/producer: Leanna Byrne )Image: Oliver Mansaray in Kink, Berlin/ Credit: Oliver Mansaray)

Whether renting or buying, housing costs are going up. Presenter Leanna Byrne takes you back home with her to Dublin, Ireland to discuss what all Dubliners love to moan about: the rising cost of renting. According to a report by Daft.ie, which lists places to rent or buy in Ireland, at the end of 2022 rent in Dublin had risen to an average $2,446 per month. And the rising price of renting has seeped into some of Ireland’s other cities, like Cork and Galway, where rents rose by 12% and 16%. Limerick and Waterford’s rental prices both soared by more than 17%. We hear from Rebecca, a 32-year-old working in the tech sector in Dublin, who has been renting for 10 years. She says that renting in Dublin is getting harder. Alex is 31 and works in banking. He got a job in Dublin in January 2022 and was worried about moving there because he heard about the housing horror stories. And finally, Norman Shapiro, senior mortgage broker with First Israel Mortgages, gives us the view from Israel, where house prices have hit a record 20% year-on-year increase. Presenter/producer: Leanna Byrne (Image: Houses/ Getty Images)

Children aren’t cheap. The cost of living crisis is pushing parents to the edge of their finances, worrying about paying for essentials like food, clothing and, for many, childcare. We’ll take a look at Chile, which according to data from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), is one of the lowest ranking when it comes to public spending on early childhood education. Natalia Aránguiz lives in Chile and has two children- she speaks to Leanna Byrne about her rising costs. Ann Hedgepeth, chief of policy and advocacy at non-profit organisation Child Care Aware of America, says the national average price of childcare was around $10,600 per year. She says one of the main factors is getting the right staff. Seven thousand miles away in Kampala in Uganda, one childcare business owner is facing the same issues. Manuela Mulondo is chief executive and founder of Cradle, a childcare, lactation and education centre. She says people never think about childcare companies when they are talking about price rises, but says it’s very expensive to look after children. Presenter/producer: Leanna Byrne (Image: Child and parent. Credit: PA)

In this first episode of our second series on the cost of living, Business Daily's Leanna Byrne looks into the areas of our lives that are costing us the most. Today we focus on our public transport systems. Figures from Statista, a market and consumer data platform, puts Auckland, New Zeland as the third most expensive city for public transport, we hear from Jon Reeves who is National Co-Ordinator and Co-Founder of the Public Transport Users Association there. When the cost of living rises, it rises for everyone. So those working in the transport sector want pay rises to reflect that. Anna Jane Hunter, partner at Winder Phillips Associates, tells Business Daily that there’s a lot of systemic issues in the UK’s transport sector that have only just bubbled to the surface again after two years of us staying at home and not using public transport. We speak to Gregor Kolbe, who works on transport and consumer politics for the Federation of German Consumer Organisations. Over the summer, Germany encouraged people to use public transport by actually reducing the cost of transport. But prices are back to normal levels now. Presenter/producer: Leanna Byrne Image: Passengers at Kings Cross Station in London/ Credit: EPA

In 2022, the sale of vinyl records in the UK made more money than CDs. You might think of it as an old fashioned way to listen to music, especially with the dominance of streaming services, but in the last 12 months, artists like Beyonce, Harry Styles and Taylor Swift have all put out major releases on vinyl. So how is the record industry coping with the increased demand? David Harper visits one of the biggest pressing plants in the world, GZ Media, which is based in the Czech Republic. Company CEO Michal Štěrba tells David that the business model is very different to when he started. He says demand started to grow in around 2003 when some other factories closed, but it hasn't stopped growing. David speaks to a Japanese record store about why younger people seem to be buying so much vinyl. And we hear from Kenyan film maker and musician Maia Lekow. She records on vinyl but can't find anywhere in Kenya to press the vinyl itself - she's ended up doing it in Australia. Some smaller independent labels tell us they're struggling to get records pressed. Andy Black owns the Popty Ping Recording company in Wales and says there's now a delay and they need to plan a lot more in advance, which can be hard when bands want to release new music. Presenter: David Harper Producers: David Harper and Victoria Hastings (Photo: GZ Media pressing plant. Credit: David Harper)