We turned the Spotlight of The Grocer 33 on top-up shopping this week by sending our mystery shoppers to Spar c-stores.
We visited Spar stores in Harrogate, Stockport, Great Kingshill in Buckinghamshire, Kingsbridge in Devon, Coleraine, Perth and Swansea. Each store was judged on availability, customer service, cleanliness, product range and extra services.
The top store was Spar in Hazel Grove, Stockport, managed by Matthew Southern.
Located on a housing estate, our shopper said the customer service was excellent, providing a cash machine, national lottery tickets, hot food, fresh cakes and extensive chilled, frozen and wine and spirit ranges.
Southern attributed its success to friendly customer service. He said: “All staff here are from the neighbourhood, which makes for a friendly atmosphere for our customers.”
The store provided a full basket as well as some strong promotional activity on some of The Grocer 33 items. It included any two quiches for £3, £1.30 off salmon steaks, Mr Muscle bathroom cleaner had a 50% extra free offer and two packs of Pepsi 2-litre was sold for £2.
The store was well laid out and easy to navigate. Most staff were friendly and helpful, especially the checkout operator.
However, one member of staff failed to offer much help in finding Aunt Bessie’s Yorkshire puddings and that left our shopper, who had children in tow, with the task of checking out a number of aisles to find the product.
Asda failed to impress our shopper in a big way this week with the quality of its service. First there was an error at the till, where parsnips were scanned through at £1.98 per kg instead of the shelf-edge price of 96p per kg.
Our eagle-eyed shopper spotted the mistake before leaving the store and was upset that it took 15 minutes of negotiating with the checkout operator and still a refund was not forthcoming.
Only when the deputy store manager was called was the refund given.
The store was clean and well merchandised with one out of stock - own label ice cream.
Winner of our top store title for showing, among other things, an unusual goodwill to a customer. The gesture was the result of its inability to provide a full basket because it does not stock 400g packs of own label wafer thin ham. Because the cost of two 200g packs would have been more expensive, our shopper was given a voucher for £1.69 - the price of the product in other Sainsbury stores - to purchase any Sainsbury cooked ham product.
The store was clean and tidy and staff helpful and friendly. That included the manager who was praising the work of one checkout operator on her retirement.
An out of stock on Green Giant Niblets sweetcorn 3-pack prevented the store from providing a full basket.
Our shopper described the store, which was recently converted from a Safeway, as clean, well-stocked and well merchandised.
She was particularly impressed with the fresh produce fixture which she said looked and smelled appetising.
Staff were helpful and professional with two-way radios that helped in the replenishment of shelves. However there were two errors at the checkout, albeit to her benefit, when the cheddar was not scanned and 0.5kg of parsnips were weighed as 0.005kg.
Although Safeway provided a full basket this week, our shopper was not impressed by the store overall.
At the time of her visit she found the store untidy with many aisles cluttered with stacking trolleys. She also found the store difficult to navigate and had particular problems locating the Branston Pickle which was stocked behind a post. She also noted that some products were stacked badly making it difficult to check their size.
Our shopper found the staff generally helpful and friendly, however at the checkout the wafer thin ham was not scanned correctly and therefore did not appear on the receipt.
One product was missing from our basket and that was parsnips which were out of stock.
The store was described as pleasant, clean and tidy and well merchandised.
However, when our shopper needed help in finding certain products she was unable to find any staff on the shop floor.
There was a 2 for £2 offer on bagged apples while a promotion on oranges offered nine for the price of six. The 4-pack of croissants was also reduced by 19p to 76p.
Our shopper was pleased to find a Somerfield with its own car park.
We visited Spar stores in Harrogate, Stockport, Great Kingshill in Buckinghamshire, Kingsbridge in Devon, Coleraine, Perth and Swansea. Each store was judged on availability, customer service, cleanliness, product range and extra services.
The top store was Spar in Hazel Grove, Stockport, managed by Matthew Southern.
Located on a housing estate, our shopper said the customer service was excellent, providing a cash machine, national lottery tickets, hot food, fresh cakes and extensive chilled, frozen and wine and spirit ranges.
Southern attributed its success to friendly customer service. He said: “All staff here are from the neighbourhood, which makes for a friendly atmosphere for our customers.”
The store provided a full basket as well as some strong promotional activity on some of The Grocer 33 items. It included any two quiches for £3, £1.30 off salmon steaks, Mr Muscle bathroom cleaner had a 50% extra free offer and two packs of Pepsi 2-litre was sold for £2.
The store was well laid out and easy to navigate. Most staff were friendly and helpful, especially the checkout operator.
However, one member of staff failed to offer much help in finding Aunt Bessie’s Yorkshire puddings and that left our shopper, who had children in tow, with the task of checking out a number of aisles to find the product.
Asda failed to impress our shopper in a big way this week with the quality of its service. First there was an error at the till, where parsnips were scanned through at £1.98 per kg instead of the shelf-edge price of 96p per kg.
Our eagle-eyed shopper spotted the mistake before leaving the store and was upset that it took 15 minutes of negotiating with the checkout operator and still a refund was not forthcoming.
Only when the deputy store manager was called was the refund given.
The store was clean and well merchandised with one out of stock - own label ice cream.
Winner of our top store title for showing, among other things, an unusual goodwill to a customer. The gesture was the result of its inability to provide a full basket because it does not stock 400g packs of own label wafer thin ham. Because the cost of two 200g packs would have been more expensive, our shopper was given a voucher for £1.69 - the price of the product in other Sainsbury stores - to purchase any Sainsbury cooked ham product.
The store was clean and tidy and staff helpful and friendly. That included the manager who was praising the work of one checkout operator on her retirement.
An out of stock on Green Giant Niblets sweetcorn 3-pack prevented the store from providing a full basket.
Our shopper described the store, which was recently converted from a Safeway, as clean, well-stocked and well merchandised.
She was particularly impressed with the fresh produce fixture which she said looked and smelled appetising.
Staff were helpful and professional with two-way radios that helped in the replenishment of shelves. However there were two errors at the checkout, albeit to her benefit, when the cheddar was not scanned and 0.5kg of parsnips were weighed as 0.005kg.
Although Safeway provided a full basket this week, our shopper was not impressed by the store overall.
At the time of her visit she found the store untidy with many aisles cluttered with stacking trolleys. She also found the store difficult to navigate and had particular problems locating the Branston Pickle which was stocked behind a post. She also noted that some products were stacked badly making it difficult to check their size.
Our shopper found the staff generally helpful and friendly, however at the checkout the wafer thin ham was not scanned correctly and therefore did not appear on the receipt.
One product was missing from our basket and that was parsnips which were out of stock.
The store was described as pleasant, clean and tidy and well merchandised.
However, when our shopper needed help in finding certain products she was unable to find any staff on the shop floor.
There was a 2 for £2 offer on bagged apples while a promotion on oranges offered nine for the price of six. The 4-pack of croissants was also reduced by 19p to 76p.
Our shopper was pleased to find a Somerfield with its own car park.
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