Winner: Asda Braunstone, Leicester
Store manager: Joe Murphy
Opened: 1979
Size: 120,000 sq ft
Market share: 14.3%
Nearest rivals: Sainsbury’s - 1.1 miles; Aldi - 2.8 miles; Waitrose - 3.1 miles
Store data source: Analysis by CACI. Call the market planning group on 020 7602 6000
You arrived a month ago. What’s it like to manage such a big store? It’s a real destination store and is part of a busy retail estate. It gets very busy between 10am and 7pm because we have lots of other stores, including an M&S and Sainsbury’s, on the same estate and it attracts a lot of people.
What’s the biggest difference in the store - apart from size - compared with where you’ve managed before? This one has a very large world food section. We have two whole aisles. It is very popular with the large ethnic population in the area. We have a lot of 10kg big packs for things like cooking oils, rice and ghee, which are very popular with Asian families.
How have you coped with the washout summer so far? It’s definitely not been as a good as last year but it’s not the first time we’ve had a wet summer in Britain. It’s about being resilient. We have had to take some markdowns on barbecue products, which has meant some really good deals for equipment - and it looks like the sun may at last be coming out this weekend.
What’s your favourite part of the store? We’ve got a really good innovation in bakery. We’ve got products such as chocolate bread which we bake in store and the new doughnuts and brownies are (excuse the pun) selling like hotcakes.
How is the revamped drinks aisle going down? We’ve got a great new lineup of gins in the BWS aisle, products like parma violet gin and lemon sorbet gin. We’ve opened up on gins massively, with lots of choice in own label and brands.
What promotions do you have at the moment? Leicester schools break up earlier than others, so we’ve already got our full back to school range out already, including a two pairs of trousers for £7 deal, which is really good value, with a 100-day guarantee. Also we do a slim-fit fashion range, which is very popular.
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