Morrisons Kilmarnock: Grocer 33 store of the week

Our shopper thought yours must have been a new store - have you had a refit? No we haven’t, so it is good to hear that the store still looks and feels fresh. In the past six months we had a new-look café put in, which has opened up the store a bit, and we also refurbished the petrol forecourt.

Your store scored top marks for customer service. This must be particularly pleasing given your role. Absolutely. The engagement of our colleagues is fantastic and they are all passionate about it. The management here like to try and lead by example. We spend a lot of time on the shop floor interacting with customers. If colleagues see we are doing it they will do it. My idea is to get everyone to think about what they would want if they were the customer.

How was Christmas trading? We had a really successful Christmas and were happy with the growth. Some of the big successes were the customer orders, which went very well, and the new The Best lines we had this year. The Best desserts sold very well. Obviously that has all changed in January and now we are selling lots of Eat Smart products. We also saw the Dry January effect but I think it’s all settling back to normal now.

Morrisons is set to ban the sale of energy drinks to under-16s - is that a good move? It is something I know some of our customers are concerned about and want us to do. They are worried about how the drinks affect children’s behaviour. We will all get training for it and I’m sure it will work well using our Challenge 25 policy.

Morrisons continues to trade well at a group level. Is that good for in-store morale? Yes, it is good to know the business is doing well. I think the main thing is that we are focused on driving the business forward through the store doing well. It’s good to know that we are doing our job and that benefits the whole company.