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Waitrose I'm a convert!

Discussion in 'Personal' started by eggnchips, Feb 4, 2011.

  1. lurk_much

    lurk_much Occasional commenter

    If you are not posh enough to appreciate an artery snagged in your teeth how are you at bringing down a brace?
  2. Winnie Woo

    Winnie Woo New commenter

    It's free to park in Aldi for two hours so they can nip over the road to Waitrose (where you have to pay to park) for all the nice stuff that they don't sell in Aldi after stocking up on cheap wine.
  3. Both Aldi and Lidl seem to be used often by 'nice' people/professionals. Mine certainly are....full of well spoken types browsing the wine, olive oils, continental meats and cheeses. It's nice shopping in there. Never too busy, no screaming kids, and the staff are definitely the best trained and most efficient and polite in my experience.
    My man was well impressed with a &pound;3.99 bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon I bought him there (14%). So impressed in fact that we have to shop at Lidl at least twice a month to stock up on supplies.[​IMG] I chanced a &pound;3.99 Rose (cannot remember the grape) and it was superb....really.
    I am not that fond of my local Waitrose. On entering the smell of fish AND cooked chickens hits the nose. Not nice. I find a general shop there is MUCH more expensive than my usual shop in either Tesco or Sainsburys. I actually like the nearest Morrison too. The bakery/bread counter is second to none. It's not far from a business park with large number of offices in it...and the suited and booted shop there lots...so I think it's gone up in the world a little to cater for them. I often see businessmen in there buying boxes of wine/whisky.
    I like to vary where I shop....and am quite lucky in that I can get to all of the big name stores without having to travel too far.
  4. dominant_tonic

    dominant_tonic Established commenter

    I see your point if service is what you are after then it's a winner I suppose. But personally, I am not prepared to pay an extra 50p/kilo for the same sugar justfor someons to take me to the shelf and hand it to me when I can do so myself. An extra 50p or so on each item for this? No. Not when the item is widely available elsewhere.
  5. magic surf bus

    magic surf bus Star commenter

    Big Aldi fan here, though mainly for the low cost gadgets, gizmos, tools and outdoor clothing. I'm led to believe that in Germany nearly half the supermarkets are Aldi style, ie pile em high and sell em cheap. I've been in one supermarket chain in Spain that made Aldi look like Harrods.
    I'm on Aldi's and Lidl's e-mail lists so I can plan my bargain buying in advance. You have to move like greased lightning to get your hands on their portable hard drives.
    They also have one of the UK's best Graduate Career programs offering a &pound;40K starting salary and a company car, but I'm led to believe you have to sell your every waking moment to the job. A bit like teaching but better paid.
  6. bombaysapphire

    bombaysapphire Star commenter

    Having read this I thought I'd go and see the price difference on 1kg of own brand golden caster.
    Waitrose &pound;1.44
    Tesco &pound;1.88
    I was so suprised I've just checked that twice. Services plus a saving. Win, win!
  7. I treat myself to a Waitrose delivery once a month and the bill isn't that dissimilar to the other big supermarkets. Yes, it can be a bit more, but when the shopping experience both on-line and at the store is so pleasant, I think the little extra it might cost is well worth it. Christmas shopping, for example on 23rd Dec was very busy but very polite and civilised: people apologised if the knocked into you or got in the way. Don't recall that happening very much is Sainsbury or Tesco.
  8. snowstorm

    snowstorm New commenter

    Recently, for my daughter's 21st, we placed a small order for canapes amounting to about &pound;13; however, when we arrived to collect, an assistant removed the lid for the box and said 'oh, we can't let you have these'; I took one look and said 'you're too right we're not having those'; they were awful, tiny and someone had mishandled the box so the toppings had dropped off.
    Anyway, a manageress came along, and after some discussion she took us around the store to collect items so I could make up the canapes at home; I only had 2hrs to do this, before her guests arrived. Anyway, I asked them to throw in a couple of bottles of champers, which they did, so we came away with over a &pound;100 of food and drink plus the original order, which I said I would salvage.
    The manageress was really apologetic and helpful and didn't put a limit on what we could choose; in fact, she lifted expensive items from the shelves and put them in our basket, including cavier.
    I thought the service and responses were excellent from the staff.
    Later on, I discovered that the same thing had happened to a friend at another branch, but they hadn't thought to ask for champers to be thrown in.
    Thanks Waitrose!
    We then trotted off to a French pattiserrie to pick up her cake, which was fab, thank goodness!!
  9. moonpenny

    moonpenny Occasional commenter

    That sounds like a posh version of supermarket sweep, snowstorm.[​IMG]

    I go to whichever supermarket is nearest at the time. I have no loyalty. I use Waitrose the least, probably because I think of it as being more expensive.
    I don't tend to order food online but we had a voucher recently for &pound;25 off shopping there so I ordered some food and can't fault how it was delivered for a low cost and sorted out in large bags to be keep and recycled . Everything was there as well. (The downside was I had to order hundreds of bogrolls which I then had to find somewhere to store to make up the &pound;50 I had to spend)
  10. moonpenny

    moonpenny Occasional commenter

  11. Professor Dumbledore

    Professor Dumbledore New commenter

    I truly envy people who have the balls to ask for this kind of thing. I am **** at complaining even when I have experienced really bad service.
    My local Tesco is just horrible. I do do my weekly shop there for the most part, as I am on a tight budget these days, but it's just not a nice experience. Anything that's on offer seems to run out immediately and not replenished and some of the staff are hopeless. Twice I've nearly been knocked over on the way in by some gross lad tearing out clutching some stolen item, followed by half the male staff. (Quite funny actually, and not really Tesco's fault.)
    I agree with the poster who praised Aldi's staff - they are fab here too, and I have a wander round Aldi every Saturday for bargains.
    Every couple of months or so I get in a bit of a strop at having to buy value/lower end stuff, so I go to Waitrose and spend a guilty &pound;20 or so. I find the staff really helpful and polite, and the customers generally more pleasant. I agree with Bunty though - there are so many indulgent things in there (salmon terrine, crab, etc!) you really have to restrict yourself. I did manage to get in at the right time a while ago though and managed to nab 2 packs of shredded salmon for 50p each (original price 3.99 each. Mmm!
  12. anon2799

    anon2799 New commenter

    I get a weekly delivery from Waitrose. Their essentials range is not as cheap as the tesco/sainsbury equivalent but the quality is good. Any errors have been rectified quickly and they once made a mistake, sent the right item the following week, let us keep the other item and sent a very expensive bottle of wine as a "sorry" gesture. Result!
  13. When I was in Oviedo in N Spain in November, I had some time to kill one day and wandered into Hipercor. It is the food side of Corte Ingles, which puts it very much in the Waitrose slot in the Spanish supermarket hierarcy. However they had a separate gastronomic section staffed by immaculately dressed young men. They had shelves full of caviar, foie gras, vintage wines and rare whiskies.
    It was like having a mini Fortnum & Mason's attached to your local Waitrose. Great for killing some time but I did not buy anything. It would go down a storm with our local Waitrose shoppers.
  14. Just about everyone here shops in Aldi and Lidl. They are actually more "upmarket" than stores such as Netto (which used to be Plus) and most of their "own" products are brand products marketed under a different name (which you can find out by googling the code on the packaging).
    They also do have a great graduate trainee scheme (as well as normal apprenticeships) - but they DO make you work for your money!
  15. BelleDuJour

    BelleDuJour Star commenter

    It does now and has done for some time. It's called the 'Essentials' range.
    If I can't get to Fortnums I use Waitrose [​IMG]
  16. Does Ocado still deliver everything in plastic carrier bags?
    I used to love getting my weekly shop delivered but I gave it up because of the huge quantity of carrier bags that came with it (some only had one item in!).
  17. anon2799

    anon2799 New commenter

    You return them the following week. I like how they're colour coded. Sad I know!
  18. Lol!
    I suppose that's an improvement. I was hoping they'd found a way of getting rid of them altogether.
  19. Our local Waitrose is a nightmare. The food is lovely, but the customers are all about 150 years old, dithering about, crashing trolleys and getting all confused around the bakery section. The checkout takes about 40 minutes because the customers get into a lather getting their wallets out and counting out pound coins, or they forget their PIN and the whole transaction has to be voided and started again...
    I once abandoned a whole trolley full of shopping halfway round the shop and ran out screaming. I could see no alternative. I would be there yet otherwise.

  20. Professor Dumbledore

    Professor Dumbledore New commenter

    Tee hee! A fair description of many Waitrose's, I suspect. Great post!

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