In a move to accommodate the growing demand in their community, David and Karen Allen, owners of a Spar store in Beaminster, Dorset, extended the site by more than 50% last August.
The co-investment between the couple and Appleby Westward - the regional wholesaler for Spar stores in the southwest - saw the store transform from 1,200 sq ft to 2,000 sq ft.
The decision to extend the store was influenced by a few issues. Firstly, the community around the store is experiencing a housing shortage, and there have been many applications and planning agreements to extend on green belt land. Therefore it was “important that the store can cope with that expansion,” David tells Convenience Store.
Secondly, David was keen to introduce Cook frozen foods, but the limited space in his store made it difficult.
“What I really needed to do was to increase the quality of experience in store. So, the only way to do that was to make the aisles wide and make the products more noticeable. Rather than singular facing, you can double face more because you have more shelf space. We bought in wider areas as you come into the store, that’s quite a vast space so that people as they enter the store don’t feel that they are in each other’s way. They feel comfortable standing, talking and things like that,” he says.
David claims that stores should consider renovations or extensions every five years: “If you don’t keep your store up to date and modernised to an extent, with new imagery and things like that, then personally, I believe you’ll fall behind.
“I’ve had the store 14 years and this is about the 4th or 5th renovation I’ve done, albeit this is the first expansion,” he says.
The work carried out by Precise Shopfitting and completed after eight weeks involved knocking through to the store’s stockroom. This has “enabled me to have the full complement of five Cook freezers and one to include dessert,” says David.
In addition, the store has seen a slightly different demographic of customers since the rollout of Cook products and David reveals the store is selling over 300 each week.
“The biggest problem we had was that we had done a complete renovation, so we had brand new floor and ceiling. So, we actually had to shut for a week, which is something you don’t want to do because it’s a large cost but you just have to for health and safety.”
Supporting the community remains high on David and Karen’s agenda. The extension has been a great help for them to introduce a local fruit and veg company Total Produce to their offering, alongside their local stock of eggs, bread and sandwiches.
“We still use Spar, but the stuff we get from Total Produce is not packaged. It’s loose and it enables our customers to buy in as small a quantity as they like because we have lots of elderly individuals that don’t want packaged products. The fruit and veg and Cook [frozen meals] go hand in hand, which is really nice,” says David.
They hope to use the extra space to continue supporting local businesses in the area.
Other additions through the extension included an increase in till systems from two to three and bringing in other services such as a slush drink machine. David mentions that these changes were made in the hopes of presenting “everything in ways that your customers can access the products visually better”.
It certainly seems to be having the desired effect, with footfall having increased 20% in the last six months, while basket spend has crept up from £8 to £10.
“We are amazed with the outcome and so are our customers,” says Karen. “Circulation around the store has been greatly improved which will help cope with the extra footfall. We currently serve over 600 customers a day and we have a great rapport with them and the local Beaminster community.”
“We get thanked daily by the community for what we’ve done,” adds David.
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