Cheap and... cheap (Lidl)

Member Name: kingseany

Product:	Lidl
Date:	05/01/06 (10249 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Cheap

Disadvantages: Untidy, not large range, odd staff, odd procedures

I'm all for shopping at cheap shops, and Lidl certainly comes into that category. I don't claim to know much about the company except that they are a German chain which seems to spring up all over the place, including here. If you type in www.lidl.com, you'll automatically go to the German site, so try www.lidl.co.uk for something that you'll understand. Not that there's much to read about, so back to the shop itself.

It's a fairly bland looking place, with wide isles. You'll need a trolley and a coin to get it. We found no baskets in ours, so a trolley is your only choice if you want more than a few items.

Merchandise is seperated into categories, so drinks, meats, personal products etc are easy enough to find. None of the sections give you much of a choice, and most of the brands are European, and you've not heard of. But they are cheap.

Fresh fruits and veg are actually very fresh, although we've had times when other fresh procuce has been anything but. Some fresh pasta, and a cheese product have both had mould on them, and put us off shopping there for a few months - this was back when it had just opened, so hopefully it was an exception.

As well as groceries, they have a habit of sticking an odd assortment of goods in the stores too. Welly boots, laminating machines, saws, photographic paper, telephones and office products. I've usually found this to be a bit of a mish mash, with many opened boxes, contents strewn about, and I'm not very confident buying a complete package. More staff are needed to monitor the goods.

Although the aisles are wide, often they leave pallets of goods in the middle, meaning it's hard to squeeze your trolley down.

Checkout is the funniest thing. They have no space to put items, after they are scanned, so you have to quickly put them back into your trolley or bags. The cashier wouldn't even start scanning until all our items were on the belt, so that he could get a fast scan rate (he said his manager was timing them all). This is pretty stupid, meaning items can easily get damaged or broken. If you are elderly, this place would be just a joke. I can understand that people don't want to wait in queue, but if there is no queue, there is no need for it, and at our supermarket it's usually not very busy. Cards or cash are accepted.

I'm not that impressed with the store as a whole, and some of the company policies, so won't choose to shop here that often.

Summary: Not that impressed