The Tesco & other non-Morrisons supermarket thread

[Pete]

I'll wait for the official lego Morrisons featuring the banana hanging system thank you very much

[thegeek]

if anybody's interested in a history of Savacentre, here's a detailed history of Savacentre from the Sainsbury's Archive:
https://www.sainsburyarchive.org.uk/sto ... savacentre

[gottago]

if anybody's interested in a history of Savacentre, here's a detailed history of Savacentre from the Sainsbury's Archive:
https://www.sainsburyarchive.org.uk/sto ... savacentre

I'm extremely interested, thank you. Interesting to see that they based it on French hypermarkets. I feel like I'm still yet to go to a British hypermarket that is anywhere near the scale of the absolutely huge, endless ones you get in rural France.

What a great site. Would love to see a long read on the Calais store (or stores plural judging by this map) which I remember reading about as a kid in one of their mags but never knew anything more about it. Vaguely remember seeing that Tesco had one as well, don't know if any other chains did?

There's a sizeable Sainsbury's Archive exhibition at the Museum of London Docklands which is publicly accessible and worth a visit if you haven't seen it before, though it hasn't been updated in several years now and could do with a refresh.

[Pete]

What a great site. Would love to see a long read on the Calais store (or stores plural judging by this map) which I remember reading about as a kid in one of their mags but never knew anything more about it. Vaguely remember seeing that Tesco had one as well, don't know if any other chains did?

Were the Calais stores not just white label booze warehouses?

[WillPS]

The Sainsburys one was just beside an Auchan supermarket, to all intents and purposes run by Auchan with English speaking (but definitely mostly French) staff in JS uniform.

https://www.alamy.com/stock-photo-the-e ... archtype=0

(I guess top-down squeezy ketchup bottles weren't a thing in France?)

You can see the colours and signage is all fairly authentic but the fixtures are most definitely not JS standard stuff.

Think the Tesco one was just a glorified Calais booze barn operation, as were plentiful in the 90s, with a wholesale arrangement. Never went there tho.

https://www.alamy.com/stock-photo-cite- ... archtype=0
https://www.alamy.com/tesco-wine-store- ... archtype=0
https://www.alamy.com/alcohol-checkout- ... 55763.html

You kind of get the vibe that Tesco's operation was on a longer leash, branding wise. Interesting that they did a crude approximation of the 'slashed pound' thing Tesco used for years with a Euro logo. Tills look fairly substantial for that sort of operation mind.

[thegeek]

You kind of get the vibe that Tesco's operation was on a longer leash, branding wise. Interesting that they did a crude approximation of the 'slashed pound' thing Tesco used for years with a Euro logo.

Remember they have plenty of stores in other parts of the Eurozone - I think I'm right in saying that Tesco Ireland's branding is pretty close to the UK's, so it's possible they created the 'slashed Euro' for there and it was an easy one to reuse.

[WillPS]

You kind of get the vibe that Tesco's operation was on a longer leash, branding wise. Interesting that they did a crude approximation of the 'slashed pound' thing Tesco used for years with a Euro logo.

Remember they have plenty of stores in other parts of the Eurozone - I think I'm right in saying that Tesco Ireland's branding is pretty close to the UK's, so it's possible they created the 'slashed Euro' for there and it was an easy one to reuse.

Maybe but I can't believe Tesco themselves would have turned out something so crappy.

[Pete]

So in addition to Tesco moving to Nixdorf hardware for their newer tills, I noticed M&S have replaced a load of NCR fastlane machines with DN units but with a different (presumably DX?) software on them.

What have NCR done wrong to deserve all this?

[BBC TV Centre]

Cost maybe, the fact that there's competition and perhap better reliability on the hardware/software.

NCR have always been the "king" of self checkouts, for years I can only remember everywhere having NCR machines for several hardware refresh cycles.

The alternatives (like the early Wincor/Nixdorf hardware used by Morrisons/Co-op) was a pretty crap experience at the time.

[Critique]

I’ve been meaning to comment on the new M&S self-service checkouts for a few months, as wherever I’ve encountered them I’ve found them to be terrible.

Firstly, they’re absolutely massive - the base to the till (which accepts cards and coins, something I recognise is increasingly rare) is huge and very clunky, but with quite a slim and glossy screen bolted on to the top. Whilst they don’t accept coins, the look is leagues apart from those little NCR tills with just the sleek little screen and then a flat shelf underneath which may or may not have a set of scales on. The UI on the new tills also isn’t great, whilst the voiceover artist they’ve chosen seems to be speaking in the sternest, most 1950s RP accent imaginable.

Above all though, the barcode scanners on the new M&S tills are either very slow or very fiddly. It takes me ages to scan anything on the new tills, whilst on an equivalent NCR unit I can zoom through scanning my shop very quickly.

[Pete]

I’ve been meaning to comment on the new M&S self-service checkouts for a few months, as wherever I’ve encountered them I’ve found them to be terrible.

I only had two items but they didn't seem the quickest.


The new zebra undocking tablets on the tesco scan as you shop is a massive improvement over those old windows ce clunkers. not only do they successfully scan the phone barcodes first time, but the handset unlocks in about 2 seconds compared to a good 7 second wait before.