great store, great prices (Asda)

Member Name: giksy21

Product:	Asda
Date:	30/07/07 (162 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: cheap, clean tidy, friendly

Disadvantages: poor quality in chilled lines

I have recently started to shop at Asda, a shop which i previously wouldn't touch with a barge pole. Why? well, a lot of peoples opinions of the shop were negative, and like the fool i am, i let them lead me. How wrong i was to do so! I will now give a review of the company, concluding with my opinion of my local branch.

The history.
The asquith family had a butchers shop in the 20's, in west yorkshire. The two sons fred and peter were active in this, and were founding fathers in the concept of one-stop shopping. Also, in the twenties arthur stockdale formed craven dairies. Through diversification, this became associated dairies and farm stores ltd with stockdale as managing director (1940's). Coming to the 60's, the asquiths and stockdales joined forces, and this is how asda was born. By the 70's 30 asda stores were opened, all pioneering the aspect of the one stop shop.
From these humble beginnings, the chain grew, and adapted to the changes in the market, to become what we see now. A company for people, with the mission statement "making goods and services more affordable for everyone". Based on this it continued to grow and develop, trying always to bring an offering of a bit of everything with them, and making it reasonably affordable for all members of the community.

Their values -

- respect for the individual - both staff and customer alike, they try to value all members of the community, and their circumstances.

- excellent service to our customers - they try to go above and beyond in terms of the service it provides.

- strive for excellence - everyday they search for new ways to improve the service it provides for its customers, without whom they would not have survived.

With its continually friendly attitude to its customers, and its belief that to enjoy is to improve, asda are somewhat different to other retailers. Listening is the key to continued success, and by lstening to what the customer wants, you are much more likely to achieve just that.

After this brief look at their history, and beliefs, we see that the value stongly the customers it serves. This has shaped how they grow, and their eventual move into financial services, and so forth. Like the founding fathers said, a one stop shop, where you can get everything you need. They have become one of the countries most prominant retailers, second only i believe to tesco.

My local store

Clean and welcoming, they generally have a greeter at the door, who says hello, and gives you a store magazine. It starts off the shopping experience with a friendly view of the staff. To the store itself, the shelves are clean and tidy, and generally well stocked. Prices are competitive, though i think the buying power of tesco makes them slightly cheaper across the board. The fruit and veg is cheap, and of very good quality. The chilled goods, i am not a fan of, believing that they are a bit too cheap, and that the quality is not there to back it up. This perhaps is just a personal opinion, but it is one aspect of shopping, where i am not willing to take a chance. Ambient groceries are where its at. Like the other store like tesco and lidl, it has offers on, and these are incredable. It would pay you to go in here and buy nothing but the offers, as the savings are fantastic. This combined with the advent of the non food lines, and also the george clothing which is fab, means that it is so much more than just grocery shopping. George clothing is of decent quality, but at a discount price, and i find it fantastic, especially for childrens clothing.
The staff let my local store down. Far from the friendly staff that its policy promotes, i find that they are all miserable!! They are very helpful, but let you know by their body language that they do not want to be! However, in fairness to them, you very rarely find happy store staff nowadays, and their not that bad really.

In conclusion, i find that this is a store thats good for a number of reasons. Food offers are excellent, with outstanding fruit and vegetables. Value for money is pretty good, especially when you move to the clothing and electrical sections, and as such i would suggest a trip to asda for all.
I cannot comment on the financial side of the store, as i personnaly have never used it, but given the good standard of the store, i would have no reason to believe that it is anything other than good.
Thanks for your time. G

Summary: a great alternative to market leader tesco