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Supermarkets in Shetland - prices, ethics and experiences


breeksy
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Long live Tesco's good luck to them the town centre mafia got rid of hodge they wont hound out Tesco's though..When one off the town centre mafia who used to cut hair started selling toys nobody said nothing and he expanded and started selling household goods i never heard Smith & Harpers or the home furnishing trying to stop him..

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I went to one of the shops on the streert two weeks ago for a pair of samba trainers size 10. I was told they did not have them in stock, i asked if they would be getting any in and was told that they usually got then in july or august. I went home and placed an order online and got them for the same price, postage free, delivered to my door two days later. I did try to support my local shop by giving them the first chance. When Tesco opens their extension i will support them as well as the shops that i usually go to when i am in town, but i will have more choice now.

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it is my understanding that the Town center association has shot themselves int he foot, for years the council has looked into pedestrianising the street to make it a more pleasant area for shoppers just for the LTCA to object because it means they would have to organise their delivery times.

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TESCO may bring a lot of satisfaction to a lot of selfish folk who canna see the end of their nose....

 

Absolute garbage. If you are a hard-pressed parent, struggling to feed your family on a very tight budget, you will get the best value you can. You would rather see your children go hungry to maintain your principles?

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^^ Exactly.

 

I find this whole "Town Centre vs The World" thing mind numbingly idiotic to be frank.

 

Just as with Chris Hodge, virtually nothing Tesco's will be selling (based on their own info and what I have personally seen in their stores on the mainland) is in any way competing with "Da Street".

 

As has been mentioned several times, for some reason the concept of budget goods seems to have almost completely escaped most of the Street's retailers.

 

*long repetitive rant deleted*

 

No point in going over it again. Put simply, unlike what many seem to think, consumers are not stupid. I knew my £5.99 Kettle from Tesco's was low quality and probably wouldn't last, but you tell me where I was supposed to suddenly magic the extra £30ish to buy one from the traditional electrical outlets, and I'll be delighted.

 

It is a very simple case of supply and demand. There is a gaping hole in the market in Shetland and hopefully Tesco's will be able to go some way to filling it and help the less well off live a little more comfortably, whilst using its "weight" to fend off the Town Centre bullies..

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well I get most of my groceries from tesco, my clothes off ebay and charity shops, my childrens clothes from primark when I go to aberdeen and most of their shoes come from amazon. that is because I couldn't get what I want from local shops and even if I could I couldn't afford it. I have 4 sons and finding any local shops which had a decent selection of clothes for them from toddler up to teenage size was virtually impossible. People will shop where they want and judging by the amount of people who use tesco, that's what they want. If people want to spend their money in local shops that's fine but I don't :D

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Now of course I can only speak for myself but the people who will suffer a loss of my business if the Tesco extension sells just about everything are Amazon.co.uk, Marks and Spencer, Premier Man and some e-bay sellers. Just how many of them are on the street?.

 

The street vendors will have to evolve to survive in the new Tescos environment. Another local business which may feel the Tesco pinch is JWG Wholesale, if that is what they are called nowadays. When I was home last summer I stayed at a guest house with attached restaurant in Lerwick and the proprietor told me he does all his shopping at Tesco because its cheaper than the wholesellers. A pulling up of socks across the board in the Lerwick market place will be no bad thing IMHO.

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If the town centre gang are so worried about lost trade etc why dont they all open on Sundays and Wednesday's when there's liners in its an emberesment being a Shetlanders having tourists asking why are these shops shut on Wed...Maybe they should realise its 2010 and competition is the name off the game these days they could cut there prices and maybe give us people who have been ripped off in years by them a small bargain for a change..(Whats going to be next with the town centre crooks ban online shopping)...??

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What I think both the street shop owners and the council is failing to see is that what constitutes the "town centre" has moved. The street was the town centre when everybody lived east of Burgh Road, it just about managed to hold on to being the town centre when everybody lived east of Clickimin. Since the town began spreading west of that and out the North Road, that "town centre" has been slipping steadily from the grasp of the street.

 

The "town centre" now is somewhere around Lochside, and its at both ends of there that the retail outlets are forming. Lets face it, who's going to fight their way through twisty turnie roads designed and made for horses and carts, and handbarrows, to get to the Street, when they can shop for what they need nearer to home with easier access.

 

If the council are hell bent on preserving the Street as a "shopping" area, I fear they, we, will have to subsidise it for it to remain that way, and that thought does not make me happy.

 

The Street in this day and age is best suited for what its slowly becoming, the "night life" town centre where most establishments cater to entertainment and leisure, plus a few nick nacks and souvenir places for day time visitors. As that it could possibly survive as the "living museum" they seem to want, but to try and keep it going with outlets for "day to day" purchases is just making a rod for everyone's back. It like forcing shopkeepers to carry all of their stock to the top of a hill up one side, and forcing their potential customers to walk up the other side to buy it, while other people have shops either side of the bottom of the hill selling the same stock.

 

The Street has survived thus far because folk have gotten in to a "habit" of going there, but lets face it, for someone in Lerwick for the first time, and just for practical purposes of ease of access and adequate space to see goods displayed and examine them before purchase. Where are they going to choose, what's around Grantfield and at Clickimin, or what's squeezed in rabbit warrens between the sea and a hill, much of it untouched since it was planned in the 18th and 19th Centuries.

 

I'm sure I've said it before on here, but as far as I'm concerned, if the council wanted to "help" local town retailers they should have one way or another encouraged them to create a new shopping area at Clickimin 30 years ago, either by building something like Bolts, and/or making available sites for self builds on favourable terms. "The Street", while quaint, and from a historical POV is probably worthy of preservation, it is long beyond obsolete as a 21st Century shopping area. The grocers went, the butchers went, the bakers have almost gone, so have the electrical retailers, only the clothes shops are trying to hang in there. Just take the place in ahead of you, its soap, wine, photos, fast food, hairdressing, jewellery, more fast food, more jewellery, more photos, sundry offices, its almost all "luxury" goods.

 

Unfortunately its far too late to claim Clickimin for anything of use now, but if the council would open up a bit more of their....ummm.....*cough* "investment" at the Seafield and encourage the few "essential" goods retailers still hanging in there on the Street to move there, and take advantage of the location and Tesco's draw on people, something might just be salvaged.

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If the town centre gang are so worried about lost trade etc why dont they all open on Sundays and Wednesday's when there's liners in its an emberesment being a Shetlanders having tourists asking why are these shops shut on Wed...Maybe they should realise its 2010 and competition is the name off the game these days they could cut there prices and maybe give us people who have been ripped off in years by them a small bargain for a change..(Whats going to be next with the town centre crooks ban online shopping)...??

 

 

stop pleepsin and moaning LCTA

 

i agree with the above statement by a previous poster, and also add that

perhaps they(LTCA) should have a look in streamline,northwards,jbt and shetland transport warehouses just to see how much goods of the same type they sell ( at higher prices) comes in the south mouth on a daily/weekly basis! and quite right too, for far too long we have been held to ransom by local retailers, an example was the tv i wanted to buy, £1200 in lerwick, £1000 in aberdeen and £ 750 from play.com so you can guess who got the order.

 

i am also glad tesco are coming with other lines, especially clothes, i have a young daughter and as parents will testify they grow out of clothes so quickly and if i can buy 5 tops for under £10 at tesco instead of 1 top on da street for the same, it makes sense dont you think? and also in these uncertain economic times it good to be able to make your pound strech further. In fact since she was born 3 yrs ago we have not bought anything up here clothing wise for her, instead stocking up at primark,tesco,asda and matalan.

 

good luck tesco, see you soon (unless LCTA muck it up for everyone)

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I THINK TESCO HAS EVERY RIGHT TO BE IN SHETLAND DON'T TELL ME ALL THE LOCAL RETAILERS SHOP IN ALL THE SMALL SHOPS AND GET ALL THERE HOUSEHOLD STUFF FROM THE LOCAL SHOPS AND AT ONE TIME PHOTO SHOP OPENED NEXT TO A PHOTO SHOP WAS THAT NOT COMPETITION AND ALL THE OTHER SHOPS SELL A BIT O EVERY THING AND AS WE ALL HAVE A RIGHT TO SHOP WHERE WE WANT

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Many years ago, I lived close to a place called Hornchurch in Essex. It wasn't a touristy area but a suburb of "Greater London". It had a range of retailers providing a whole range of things to the locals but gradually shops were closing up and the "for sale" and "to let" boards became common and the locals went elsewhere and to the huge out of town shopping centre at Thurrock Lakeside.

Sainsbury's came to the centre of the small town, amidst huge opposition from the local retailers yet it gave the locals a big reason to visit the place again. Shops started re-opening and the place thrived again.

Lerwick is obviously totally different as there are no alternatives for regular shopping, leaving aside Scalloway and the village shops, but the current shop-owners need to realise that we are living in a different world and either adapt to change or go under. Even now, before the Tesco extension opens up, many folks here are buying online and that is just the way things are. The Commercial street guys can't blame that on Tesco so they either have to match the online traders with better service and a closer match on price or go under. I am sorry to say that it is mainly the non-computer savvy local population who will buy local irrespective of price. There are, of course, those who will do so from principle but their principles cost them money. Their choice.

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It will be a very sad day when Commercial Street becomes a ghost town but that's exacly what will happen once Tesco is in full swing. And speaking of tourists it will give them even less to look at when they come ashore in the tenders. At least there's a little bit of life to be seen just now...

 

Listening to the Tesco man on Radio Shetland last night it was plain as day to see that they've either broken or are severely bending the planning consent they applied for and got. But that's Tesco for you and the warnings have been sounding for years and I personally think we'll come to rue the day they set foot here....

 

On the other side of the coin has anybody ever seen how H***y from Harry's Dept Store treats his staff?. It certainly puts me off giving him some of my penga. He'd get a clout from a piece of 6x4 if he spoke to me like yon.

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The street will continue to attract locals as long as it has the banks and the chemists. And indeed people wanting a haircut or some shoes. And a lot of people do visit the charity shops. Tesco will not put a stop to that and is unlikely to be much of a challenge to the more specialist shops including The Hansel and indeed Harrys. In fact I think the shop on the street that has the most to lose is the Hydro shop and frankly I am not too bothered about that.

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I think I'll just end up repeating mostly what is being said but I've had issues in local shops, and refuse to go back into some. I'm all for Tesco and can't wait to see the expansion. If the street 'dies' it is no fault of anyone than the shop owners themselves. (*** Mod - Snipped for T&Cs ***)

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