Spar retailers in the West Country who fail to provide a basic food-to-go offer are letting down every store in the UK and worldwide, a store owner has claimed.
Chris Sharrinton, who runs the Spar in Helston, Cornwall, told an audience of 1,000 at the Appleby Westward Tradeshow in Exeter: “It’s time to chuck away the outdated pasty warmer on the counter and at least start with a proper entry level food-to-go unit. If you don’t start doing the basics properly now, you are letting down the Spar brand and every store in the world under the symbol.”
He told the tradeshow he invested in food to go in 1992 to counter the arrival of a Tesco store half a mile away. Now a standalone operation in-store, it contributes 25% gross profit and turnover of £4,000 a week.
Nearly 170 suppliers, a record, exhibited at the tradeshow.
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