Latest news with #Tescos
The Irish Sun
3 days ago
- General
- The Irish Sun
People are only just realising why so many supermarkets have a clock tower and it's blowing their minds
SUPERMARKETS across England have one feature that is often overlooked by shoppers. Brits were floored to find out the reason why so many stores seem to have a clock tower. Advertisement 4 In 1991, 23 of the 28 Tescos that were built had clocktowers Credit: Alamy 4 Pictured is the clock on the Tesco Extra store in Swindon Credit: Alamy Filmmaker Chris Spargo took to YouTube to explain the history. He also pointed out that many of the clocks don't actually show the correct time. The trend dates back to the 1970s, when an Essex council was given a very strict design guide. It wanted to put a supermarket next to the town square but the council was firmly told that the building had to have "specific Essex characteristics". Advertisement Read more The YouTuber explained: "So Asda came up with an idea. 15 miles away in a town called Coggeshall, there is a 14th century barn and a Victorian clock tower." From there, UK chains seemed to draw inspiration and replicas started popping up everywhere. It went on to be known as the "Essex barn style". In 1991, 23 of the 28 Tescos that were built had clocks. Advertisement Most read in Fabulous Way into the 1990s, Tesco, Sainsbury's and Morrisons all built stores in this way. However, new stores being built today are less likely to have the feature. One comment by a dumbfounded Brit read: "This is something I've simultaneously noticed everywhere and yet never noticed." Writing in a thesis on the history of supermarket designs, academic Audrey Kirby said: "Possibly the design provided the customers with a classless feeling of comfort, security, wholesomeness and prosperity." Advertisement 4 The Millennium Clocktower and Sainsbury's at the shopping centre on the High Street in Littlehampton, West Sussex Credit: Alamy 4 A clock on the Tesco in Rickmansworth, Hertfordshire Credit: Getty
Scottish Sun
4 days ago
- General
- Scottish Sun
People are only just realising why so many supermarkets have a clock tower and it's blowing their minds
Click to share on X/Twitter (Opens in new window) Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window) SUPERMARKETS across England have one feature that is often overlooked by shoppers. Brits were floored to find out the reason why so many stores seem to have a clock tower. Sign up for Scottish Sun newsletter Sign up 4 In 1991, 23 of the 28 Tescos that were built had clocktowers Credit: Alamy 4 Pictured is the clock on the Tesco Extra store in Swindon Credit: Alamy Filmmaker Chris Spargo took to YouTube to explain the history. He also pointed out that many of the clocks don't actually show the correct time. The trend dates back to the 1970s, when an Essex council was given a very strict design guide. It wanted to put a supermarket next to the town square but the council was firmly told that the building had to have "specific Essex characteristics". The YouTuber explained: "So Asda came up with an idea. 15 miles away in a town called Coggeshall, there is a 14th century barn and a Victorian clock tower." From there, UK chains seemed to draw inspiration and replicas started popping up everywhere. It went on to be known as the "Essex barn style". In 1991, 23 of the 28 Tescos that were built had clocks. Way into the 1990s, Tesco, Sainsbury's and Morrisons all built stores in this way. However, new stores being built today are less likely to have the feature. One comment by a dumbfounded Brit read: "This is something I've simultaneously noticed everywhere and yet never noticed." Writing in a thesis on the history of supermarket designs, academic Audrey Kirby said: "Possibly the design provided the customers with a classless feeling of comfort, security, wholesomeness and prosperity." 4 The Millennium Clocktower and Sainsbury's at the shopping centre on the High Street in Littlehampton, West Sussex Credit: Alamy
Yahoo
16-03-2025
- Yahoo
Tesco 'install new anti-shoplifting devices' on shelves- but customers confused how they work
Tesco's new anti-shoplifting measures have left customers bewildered. The new contraptions have been captured in a video posted to X, formerly known as Twitter, which has left the internet in a frenzy. The clear plastic covers can be seen positioned in front of a shelf of chocolate products.. In the video, customers are able to freely slide them left and right to uncover the products underneath. The covers make a loud screeching noise when moved. It would seem that they would make it harder to access the items quickly, although Tesco has not yet confirmed how the new covers are meant to work. It is also not yet clear if the new contraptions have been rolled out in all stories or just a certain selection of them. READ MORE: 'I went to London's 'model village' where there aren't any shops and every house has a garden' READ MORE: New pub rule from April 1 will be 'incredibly disappointing' for punters Tescos New Security Devices, what do you think? ( kirkpap1 ) — London & UK Street News (@CrimeLdn) March 14, 2025 The video posted to X has been causing quite a commotion - amassing 1.3k comments and 6.3k likes in about a day-and-a-half. One commenter posted: "So how can you actually get the item? They do not have enough staff to be getting these items for people." Another pointed out: "What's stopping someone from simply prying the damn things open and taking what they want?" However, another user had one potential theory behind the new plastic covers. They posted: "They take your fingerprints if you steal and build a case to which they don't have to chase you across the parking lot thus avoiding public videos and backlash on the shopping establishment" Another theory suggested that the loud noise the covers make when slid was meant to attract staff members. Perhaps the most likely theory posted was that they had been installed to slow thieves down and deter "flash mob robberies." Shoplifting offences in London have soared by 50 per cent according to the latest figures. The Met Police documented 78,512 cases of shoplifting in the year leading up to September - a significant rise from 52,478 offences recorded the previous year. Across England and Wales, police forces reported a total of 493,000 offences in this same period - a 23 per cent increase from the 402,000 incidents in the prior 12 months. Trade Association British Retail Consortium has described the situation as shoplifting "spiralling out of control", citing their survey that indicates over 2,000 incidents occurring daily, including assaults on staff, threats with weapons, and racial and sexual abuse. Tesco Stores has not yet commented on the new anti-shoplifting measures. Got a story? Please get in touch at Get the top stories from across London directly to your inbox. Sign up for MyLondon's The 12 HERE to get the biggest stories every day.
The Guardian
25-02-2025
- Business
- The Guardian
‘Consumers need one-to-one attention': the food and drink CEO on why corner shops are the heart of their communities
Walking the aisles of his 120,000 sq ft warehouse, Jason Wouhra gestures towards boxes of crisps, of every conceivable brand and flavour, stacked high on towering 15m-tall shelves. 'We sell £18m worth of crisps every year. Just crisps,' he says. 'Millions of boxes of food and drink come through here. We're restocking every day. Yesterday when I came into work there were already eight lorries parked up on the street waiting to get in.' Wouhra is CEO of Lioncroft Wholesale, one of the country's biggest wholesalers, selling food and drinks products to over 10,000 businesses across the Midlands and further afield from its Birmingham and Wolverhampton depots. Many of these customers are owners of independent corner shops, often husband-and-wife teams taking it in turns to man the shop and stock the shelves. His huge cash and carry on the edge of the Aston Expressway in north Birmingham has become an important social hub for them working in an increasingly tough market. 'It's a very hard game to be in. You can imagine, a lot of these stores open at six in the morning and close at 10 at night. And they're working with very small margins, there isn't any fat to cut,' he says. 'And progressively, over the last two decades, they've faced head-on competition from big rivals, like the Tescos and Sainsbury's of the world. But independent shops are the heart of their communities. We can't afford to lose that, because it would fundamentally change the landscape of consumer choice in the UK.' Wouhra says there has been a growing trend since Covid for people to manage their money by buying smaller baskets more frequently, rather than doing a big weekly shop, and corner shops have benefited from this. But they're up against corporate competition, inflationary pressures, energy cost increases and rises in the national minimum wage, which have all conspired to make running a corner shop harder than ever. Confidence among small businesses has hit its lowest point in 10 years, outside of the Covid pandemic, according to the Federation of Small Businesses. 'We're at the point where it's unsustainable,' Wouhra says. 'When you're in a low margin industry, where do you go to make savings?' Wouhra's passion is helping these corner shops thrive in the face of tough competition – it's in his bloodstream, he says, because of his background. His father and uncles set up East End Foods, an Asian food company specialising in spices, lentils and rice, in Wolverhampton in 1972, after moving to the UK from India. 'You can imagine being in a family business, I was involved from an age where I could barely walk. I was in and around the business, playing in the warehouse and eventually stacking shelves,' he says. 'When I was seven or eight, I remember getting told off by one of the managers for not stacking things properly. And that has still stuck with me today.' That business became one of the most successful Asian food brands in Europe; the family sold it to a private equity firm in 2019. But Wouhra says he wasn't ready to hang up the reins yet, and the following year he bought back the wholesale arm of the business which he now runs as Lioncroft, with the support of his wife, Daali, his parents and younger brother. 'It's a challenging business. Before, the family as a unit were all together and it was a very big company. Now all of a sudden I'm on my own and I've got to run this business, I've got to make a success of it. It's the legacy of my family,' he says. Lioncroft works with hundreds of brands to secure stock and promotional deals, that are then sold on to the thousands of corner shops, restaurants, takeaways and cafes who shop at their warehouse. The company also helps advise stores on specialisms, such as ethnic food offerings, that some corner shop owners may not know much about. Sign up to Observed Analysis and opinion on the week's news and culture brought to you by the best Observer writers after newsletter promotion 'More and more people cook at home, so they want to go into a local store and be able to pick up that stuff and it be available,' Wouhra says. He also the interim chair of Unitas, the UK's biggest independent wholesale buying group, with buying power of £8bn. 'Food and drink wholesale is a massive industry. But because it sits in the background, people don't necessarily recognise how big it is,' he says. Research by the Federation of Wholesale Distributors found that food and drink wholesalers support 1.5m jobs across the UK, and generated £57bn of value added to the economy in 2023/24. 'Independently owned businesses, even today, are the lifeblood of the economy. It's just that regulators aren't seeing or acknowledging it. They'll always err towards bigger corporate operators,' he adds. Wouhra says 'the high street has been decimated' in recent years, and the government needs to take action to fill the empty shops that litter towns and cities, and help people get businesses off the ground. 'Do we all just want to sit in front of a computer screen and shop? I doubt it,' he says. 'I think the consumer wants more choice. And the only way you'll get that is through independent traders, entrepreneurs who build up their own business and look after their customers one-to-one. 'So that would be my biggest ask, whether through tax savings or other incentives: what can policymakers do to regenerate the high street, because it's been absolutely battered.' Wouhra, who was recently appointed as the chancellor of Aston University, the first Sikh to hold such a post at a European university, says he likes to think the success his family achieved could be replicated under present day circumstances, but it is 'becoming more difficult'. 'We're an immigrant family. My family came here in the late 60s with three quid. They created something out of necessity, and that necessity became an entrepreneurial spirit,' he says. 'There will be thousands of families and individuals with a dream like that, of where they could take their life. We need to create the landscape for them to do that.' Age 47 Family Wife Education Wylde Green College, Sutton Coldfield; St Philip's Sixth Form College, Birmingham; BA in Law with Business, Staffordshire University; LLM in Commercial Law, Staffordshire University; Charter director qualification, Institute of Directors (youngest in the world at the time to achieve that qualification). Pay Undisclosed. Last holiday South of France. Best advice he's been given 'Work hard and the results will look after themselves.' Biggest regret 'Not having gone into my own business sooner.'Phrase he overuses 'Move at pace and keep things simple.'How he relaxes 'Good food and rubbish TV.'
