Has the credit crunch affected your promotional activity in any way and if so how? We’re certainly concentrating more on half-price offers throughout the store and less on bogofs and three-for-twos. Customers are looking to make savings at the moment and because of this, money-off deals are proving most popular.

The CACI data suggests that of the big five retailers, Morrisons is least suited to Bath. How do you compete effectively in such an affluent area? 

We concentrate on the core Morrisons principle of fresh produce at great value, and our customers really buy into that. For example, our fresh fish department is a real hero department at the moment and I’m convinced we’re taking a lot of business away from Waitrose and Sainsbury’s in this area.

Do you source your fresh produce locally? 

We tend to patronise a lot of southwestern products. At the moment we’re stocking local pies and fresh chicken from the Wye Valley, as well as West Country milk.

What would you change about the store if anything? 

We’re quite a small store at 20,000 sq ft, so increasing the retail space is very high on our agenda. We’re currently waiting on planning permission to extend the store by an extra 5,000 sq ft. Because Bath is a world heritage city it can be very difficult to get permission for new developments but we’re optimistic.

What would you use the extra retail space for?

We’d be looking to increase our non-food offering. At the moment we can’t offer a full non-food range because of the lack of space.

How do you ensure high standards of customer service and availability are maintained?

It’s a daily challenge, not a once-a-week operation. We have monitoring tools and run blind checks to ensure staff are focused on the job in hand. We also monitor stock levels on a daily basis to keep availability high.