aldi

Aldi has won the service award for the first time in its latest guest retailer appearance, with its “newly refurbished” and “neatly presented” Lewisham store also scoring full points for car park and shop floor service thanks to “excellent customer service” and a “wide range of Continental products”. 

Sainsbury’s Kidlington was three points behind, thanks to an “easy to navigate” layout and “excellent” counter services. However, our shopper was unimpressed with the lack of shop floor staff, particularly after finding a group “huddled away chatting”. The checkout process was also “a little slow”.

In third place, Waitrose Hailsham suffered from poor availability and a strange store layout. Counter services appeared “attractive” but were fairly limited in their offerings. Staff, though “helpful”, were sometimes difficult to locate. 

Tesco Cardiff outperformed its rivals with its checkout service but shop floor staff failed to direct our shopper to the correct aisles. A “variety of uniforms” made it difficult to identify staff and no one checked the stockroom for items not on shelves. 

“Gaps in the fruit aisle” and a “limited range of frozen goods” lost points for Morrisons Milton Keynes. Finding staff proved difficult and the store layout was illogical. More open checkouts could have helped.

It was a disastrous week for Asda Parkhead. Pot holes riddled its car park, “boxes and cages” were left in aisles, produce was “untidy” and only four checkouts were open. Only two staff members could be located for help and five items were out of stock.