Shoppers at at Waitrose in Marlborough have been enjoying a new experience – being offered something different and tasty to eat or a new wine to try as they wander the aisles looking for Christmas delights.
And the man greeting them with goodies is none other than Waitrose’s ebullient manager Andy Davies, back on duty again after a six months spell on a special Waitrose/John Lewis assignment in London.
That gave him the opportunity to see for himself exactly how the capital’s big stores are operating with innovative ideas to tempt customers in tough economic times, and see for himself how people are both trading up – and down too.
“When I came back here to Marlborough I wanted to share with my senior team the kind of experience I had and seen operating in London,” Andy told Marlborough News Online.
“So with my assistant Steve Tuddenham we did Harrods and other stories in the banking area at Canary Wharf to look at different ways we could do things, introduce different products and be more innovative.”
“So you saw me today offering customers a taste of Italian Pan Forte, and I’ve been more impromptu by suddenly opening a bottle of wine and giving customers a taste, just to get them to try something different.”
“It’s all part of some really interesting and unusual things we can do at Christmas and it’s a great time of the year to showcase something different when people do traditionally trade up at this time of the year, irrespective of the kind of financial year they’ve had.”
It’s something too you are unlikely to find happening in other supermarkets.”
While Andy is confident that Waitrose Marlborough will break last year’s record takings, what worries him is that it depends on the weather.
“More people are coming into Marlborough to do their shopping than last year and to take advantage of our special officers,” he pointed out. “And we’ve certainly seen top end products selling extremely well.”
“The tricky thing is the weather, it’s a key issue for us. If we have snow then you can’t get sprouts out of the ground and you can’t transport them down the M4. So we do need to have the weather on our side.”
Fashionable changes already obvious is that while artisan cheeses took off last year one unexpected focus this year has been the increasing sale of specialised bottles of high quality gin – and English sparkling wines too as well as cut-price champagne.
Saturday’s sales figures boosted Waitrose’s staff and it moved into the biggest week of the year. “We expect to serve 32,000 customers this week more than any other week of the year,” said Andy. “We will manage 1,300 customer orders for turkeys and Waitrose entertaining lines on Saturday/Sunday and Monday.”
“Every part of our business is at full capacity ensuring products are successfully moved from the field to the Christmas plate of our customers. All of the partners work extremely hard planning, serving and re stocking 24 hours a day.”
Waitrose is also benefiting from its John Lewis partnership connection which allows customers to buy anything they wish online through the click and collect online connection, which sees goods delivered for pick up within 24 hours.
“It all fits into the statistics which show that the UK has the biggest online buying audience in the world,” said Steve. “We had 280 orders alone last week across a whole range of goods, though they don’t tend to be divan beds, more reasonably sized parcels that can be carried by courier.”
“Customers really like the system, their reaction is very positive and, of course, it all helps to promote the John Lewis partnership brand.”
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