What’s it like to be a retailer in Bristol? When one of our partners started the other day she was welcomed by a regular to “their shop”. It’s that kind of feel. We’re a little bit out from the city centre, and the only Waitrose in Bristol other than the two convenience shops. It means we’re a funny mix of an absolute community shop and a real destination shop. My first day with Waitrose was in this shop 17 years ago; I returned last year. We have 145 partners. The store manager Chris White, who is away on very well-deserved annual leave, is absolutely the reason the shop is led the way it is.
What’s the store like? From the outside you’d think we were a traditional suburban supermarket, but our lunch time trade is surprisingly strong. We have a very particular rush on a Sunday for rotisserie chickens. We’re relatively small, but heavily traded – we have a queue outside every morning before we open. We’re in the top 10-15 stores for John Lewis click & collect. Our demographic is a lot of professional working people but also parents with fairly young children. They come in for bits and bobs, but also the speciality ranges. Ottolenghi sells really well here, as does our No.1 range, which has absolutely flown off the shelves since its relaunch.
That’s a lot of complexity to manage as a small store. How do you do it? Have you heard of the elves and the shoemaker? We work a bit like that. Our night team are amazing. It means we come in every morning to a perfect shop, leaving the partners in the daytime free to focus all of their efforts on customer service. We hold a full recovery every day between the end of lunch trade and before schools finish. All the partners and managers get together and walk the shop, pulling everything forward, removing cardboard and facing it up. We aim for the customers that come in after school to get the same experience as those that come in the morning. We have no e-com at all, Bristol is serviced by surrounding stores.
Waitrose is investing heavily into the south west, with a new supermarket and DC. How will you benefit from that? Our density of trade shows how much demand there is for more Waitrose stores in the south west. It’s massively positive news. It brings job opportunities to the area, and new opportunities for existing managers or partners who want to work their way up. We all help each other out already – we’ll often send management or partner cover to other Bristol stores when they need it. The more stores we have in the area stronger the partnership is. Practically, our deliveries currently come from Bracknell; lorries driving fewer miles can only be a good thing. Operationally the new DC will be able to look after 100 stores, that speaks not only of the investment, but also the intention in the business.
Have you exited Christmas smoothly? Christmas was awesome. Our availability was solid. Distribution did a great job before, during and after. People don’t always want to talk about after Christmas, because it can be tough, but we’ve come out of Christmas trading really well. It’s felt very controlled. There’s a real buzz in the business. The Christmas ad was an absolute belter. Our new MD (Tom Denyard) has just started. We sell some wonderful food. Everything points towards that momentum continuing.
What’s your biggest challenge as a store team over the next year? I want partners to continue to enjoy coming into work. I want us to always strive to be better than we were the week before. Our focus is on developing partners. We can always tweak and improve things, but we don’t need huge change. It sounds trite, but we just need to keep trying and helping each other to be better.
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