Metropol

Yeah they went through a time of doing the "ASDA part of the Wal*Mart Family" on the bags and even a nasty green and blue uniform, glad someone sorted that out. Then again the Asda Supermarket Uniform looks a bit rank.

DJDave wrote:Yeah they went through a time of doing the "ASDA part of the Wal*Mart Family" on the bags and even a nasty green and blue uniform, glad someone sorted that out. Then again the Asda Supermarket Uniform looks a bit rank.

There are even a few "ASDA WAL-MART Supercentres", Sheffield-Handsworth for one.

The big sign that advertises what is in-store at our local Asda calls it 'Part of the Wal*Mart family'. This is the only place it's seen at the nearest Asda. The same store seems to always have a stand outside the entrance informing you it's the cheapest supermarket for the XXth year running.

Regarding ASDA's POS systems, I was once in the Handsworth Sheffield ASDA (the Wal-Mart branded one as WillPS mentioned) and there was a brief power cut for about 10 seconds. The tills took around 10 minutes to reboot and reconnect themselves, causing havoc as shopping had to be rescanned and customers piled up at the checkouts waiting for the tills to come back to life.

WillPS wrote:

DJDave wrote:Yeah they went through a time of doing the "ASDA part of the Wal*Mart Family" on the bags and even a nasty green and blue uniform, glad someone sorted that out. Then again the Asda Supermarket Uniform looks a bit rank.

There are even a few "ASDA WAL-MART Supercentres", Sheffield-Handsworth for one.

They're now "ASDA supercentres"
Minworth changed not so long back.

Beep wrote:

WillPS wrote:

DJDave wrote:Yeah they went through a time of doing the "ASDA part of the Wal*Mart Family" on the bags and even a nasty green and blue uniform, glad someone sorted that out. Then again the Asda Supermarket Uniform looks a bit rank.

There are even a few "ASDA WAL-MART Supercentres", Sheffield-Handsworth for one.

They're now "ASDA supercentres"
Minworth changed not so long back.

Yeah, since I've moved to Sheffield it's only referred to itself as "ASDA" on the PA system etc.

What's happened to the handful of Wal-Mart stores (that pre-date the ASDA takeover)?

Talking of Asda, I just found out that Louise Redknapp recorded a charity single to the melody of Asda's jingle.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9U3ypl8TkBs

Regarding instore branding, I am quite disappointed that Asda have decided to persist with that horrible poison dart frog colour scheme, which has recently been extended across all own-brand packaging. If that wasn't bad enough, at my local store they have cladded the walls in MDF and painted it burgundy, and battleship grey shelving units have replaced the old ones. The whole atmosphere of the place now is dreadful.

I went to (retail nerd's paradise) Merry Hill yesterday, and found the ASDA setup in the mall quite fascinating. The checkouts were all flush to the mall, so when you took your trolley round you actually left the store. The tobacco kiosk was actually in the middle of the mall. Definitely worth a look if one finds oneself nearby, the mall is an eighties hideosity treasure trove!

Chie wrote: Regarding instore branding, I am quite disappointed that Asda have decided to persist with that horrible poison dart frog colour scheme, which has recently been extended across all own-brand packaging. If that wasn't bad enough, at my local store they have cladded the walls in MDF and painted it burgundy, and battleship grey shelving units have replaced the old ones. The whole atmosphere of the place now is dreadful.

It works well in stores with lots of natural light, but badly in stores that don't.

Yes the newer stores with big windows at the front and lots of skylights look great with the burgundy walls. The older B&Q metal box style ones do not work.

The Merry Hill style seems to be a European type thing where the checkouts have the opening to the mall behind them rather than a wall / windows. Certainly I've seen branches of Real in Germany and Essenlunga in Italy that had this layout with a shopping centre attached.

And yes I bought bags for life from both of them and brought them home

WHAT OF IT?

Pete wrote:The Merry Hill style seems to be a European type thing where the checkouts have the opening to the mall behind them rather than a wall / windows. Certainly I've seen branches of Real in Germany and Essenlunga in Italy that had this layout with a shopping centre attached.

I didn't know that - but what seems ever strangerer is that Sainsbury's at the other end of the mall is in the normal format, and if the Rosie & Jim Bumper Video I watched 1000 times as a child is anything to go by, it always has been.

The whole mall is extremely higeldy pigeldy, so it might be that the mall up to Sainsbury's was not there when Sainsbury's opened.

The Merry Hill Asda was built as a Carrefour, so it could be that they had that layout since it opened, and Asda just carried it over when they aquired it.