The Unofficial Sainsbury's Thread

[Zimba]

Spennymoor has always had a little shop, but yes that would seem to be an outlier.

They added a forecourt to the Byker store in the last few years. Surprisingly, it has an old school staffed drive thru booth and only two of the pumps are P@P.

No idea why.

Ah I assumed that was an ex co-op or something. Yeah Darlington and Ashington has rebuilds and they were the same, Darlington was bizarre as it was fully pay at pump at first but then had a booth retrofitted in so guessing there must have complaints about it.

https://www.alamy.com/1996-the-asda-sup ... 72574.html

It seems that Asda has been using the booths since at least the 80s, based on that image.

That whole set of images is brilliant for some 90s supermarket nostalgia - the store was closed and replaced with a new build supercentre a couple of years after in 98/99.

Yeah ASDA Blyth has had them since it's opening I believe and that's an 80's store. It's recently been rebuilt though and had them removed altogether though.

https://www.alamy.com/1995-then-brand-n ... 88732.html - There's some of Morrison's at Morton Park in Darlington on it's opening looking very smart aswell even featuring the famous banana stand in the background. Shame the entrance is an absolute mess nowadays with bulk buy pallets allover the place and the fruit and veg area is bland like all shops nowadays pretty much.

Also a bit of random trivia that store has a massive 1990's Morrison's logo on the roof for planes flying into Teesside Airport.

[bilky asko]

https://www.alamy.com/1995-then-brand-n ... 88732.html - There's some of Morrison's at Morton Park in Darlington on it's opening looking very smart aswell even featuring the famous banana stand in the background. Shame the entrance is an absolute mess nowadays with bulk buy pallets allover the place and the fruit and veg area is bland like all shops nowadays pretty much.

Safeway can go and shove it with those fantastic images.

[Zimba]

Safeway can go and shove it with those fantastic images.

Totally agreed, it's crazy how over designed the 90's Morrison's stores were for effectively a little supermarket in the North at the time. The stores definitely went downhill after the Safeway takeover trying to force Market Street into them then realising they couldn't so dumbing down the existing estate especially the Store of the Future refurbs.

[Philip]

Come on though, if only all Safeway stores had ended up with this style: https://www.flickr.com/photos/66435887@ ... 6043035960

[Pete]

I adore the plants inside the lights, absolute peak 90s

https://www.alamy.com/1995-then-brand-n ... 88728.html

[WillPS]

As a rule of thumb - Asda filling stations built in the 80s tended to have a little hut which all pumps had to walk up to to pay:
https://www.google.com/maps/@53.1275039 ... 312!8i6656

Asda filling stations built in the 90s doubled up on those huts, set them further back and made them drive thrus:
https://www.google.com/maps/@52.9672304 ... 312!8i6656

Some of each of those formats were later built or altered to have pay at pump - this tended to be sites which had a 24 hour store (so the Sutton one up top did, the Hyson Green one below didn't).

Pay at pump only sites started to appear in the late 90s, initially normally limited to places where there was not sufficient space for a full PFS set up:
https://www.google.com/maps/@52.9003346 ... 312!8i6656

By the 10s pretty much every new build was pay at pump only, and some of the drive thru sites became unmanned in this era too:
https://www.google.com/maps/@52.9672478 ... 312!8i6656

Then in the weird era when Asda added the Wal-mart logo to theirs (despite being lined up to be sold) and they bought out Netto v1 - they started installing full size shops for the first time, both as newbuilds:
https://www.google.com/maps/@53.3771018 ... 312!8i6656

and also as rebuilds/retrofits:
https://www.google.com/maps/@53.1276234 ... 312!8i6656

Pay at pump only continued to be installed when space required:
https://www.google.com/maps/@53.3602904 ... 384!8i8192
https://www.google.com/maps/@53.0056063 ... 312!8i6656
(note that despite being automated, those stations (like Costco ones) are only open set hours linked to the store's - this is because someone must be on site in the event of an emergency)

As I said before, I expect Eurogarages will be converting all they can to the 'massive shop with an assortment of Cinnabon/Sparro/Greggs etc + ice blasts, vapes and Starbucks on-the-go' format when they can. Pay at pump is not normally part of what they do as the profit lies in the shop rather than the pumps.

[Pete]

are the ARC / IMO car washes also owned (or at least land leased by) Asda? I've never seen an asda car wash but there are lots of IMOs next to, but not part of, Asda branches.

[scottishtv]

Asda filling stations built in the 90s doubled up on those huts, set them further back and made them drive thrus:
https://www.google.com/maps/@52.9672304 ... 312!8i6656

This is interesting. I was following the link to Paul White photos on Alamy (posted earlier) and I noticed there's a photo of a 1996 drive-thru where it seems the front-seat passenger needs to pay instead of the driver:

Exhibit A and Exhibit B.

Hard to tell whether that other booth is for customers or if there's two people manning both sides of that middle booth. If you picked a side, I'd imagine one cashier was a lot busier than the other?!

Anyway, that photographer provided me with a treat today. Supermarket pics, a high-street TSB, a McDonald's drive-thru, indoor plants and parasols, and yet more plants... perfect!

[WillPS]

are the ARC / IMO car washes also owned (or at least land leased by) Asda? I've never seen an asda car wash but there are lots of IMOs next to, but not part of, Asda branches.

They do exist: https://www.google.com/maps/@52.4110436 ... 312!8i6656

Although that site is very much an exception to prove a rule sort of place - that place was a Co-op until 10 or so years ago with a BP filling station. Then Asda appear to have used it with a shop until about 2017 then demolished it to turn it in to a drive thru... despite that being the era when other drive thrus were removed to make way for a shop!

Dunno about the relationship between IMO and Asda, but that site is certainly large enough to fit a full IMO style car wash if they wanted to. Incidentally IMO have themselves rebranded in the last couple of months:


This seems to be getting used at ARC car washes too on their price lists and whatnot.

[WillPS]

Asda filling stations built in the 90s doubled up on those huts, set them further back and made them drive thrus:
https://www.google.com/maps/@52.9672304 ... 312!8i6656

This is interesting. I was following the link to Paul White photos on Alamy (posted earlier) and I noticed there's a photo of a 1996 drive-thru where it seems the front-seat passenger needs to pay instead of the driver:

Exhibit A and Exhibit B.

Hard to tell whether that other booth is for customers or if there's two people manning both sides of that middle booth. If you picked a side, I'd imagine one cashier was a lot busier than the other?!

Anyway, that photographer provided me with a treat today. Supermarket pics, a high-street TSB, a McDonald's drive-thru, indoor plants and parasols, and yet more plants... perfect!

Wow that really is a treat, thanks for sharing. I recognise that sign with 2 arrows, but it would be mounted on the left of the 2 booths, indicating that drivers could go to either booth.

I had no idea there was once an Asda in Orgreave - sounds like it was a nightmare as the whole thing was on a steep hill.

[scottishtv]

Wow that really is a treat, thanks for sharing. I recognise that sign with 2 arrows, but it would be mounted on the left of the 2 booths, indicating that drivers could go to either booth.

It is a treat, but full credit to woah who picked up on this image set further up!