Costcutter and Nisa have both announced recruitment successes in the run-up to the expiry of their current supply agreement this summer.

Costcutter Supermarkets Group reported that it opened 353 new accounts in the year to December 2013, 243 of which were Costcutter or Kwiksave stores, and 110 under the former P&H-affiliated brands Mace, Supershop and Your Store, which Costcutter took management of in April.

Under the new buy and supply arrangement, which takes effect from 1 July, P&H will take over from Nisa the distribution of product to all store brands managed by the Costcutter group.

At the same time, Nisa Retail is also claiming recruitment successes, with 689 stores joining during the calendar year, including a significant number of former Costcutter stores transferring their allegiance to Nisa.

Williams Supermarket, a 9,500sq ft store in Somerton, Somerset, with a weekly turn-over of £70,000, has moved to Nisa, taking on new in-store imagery and installing Nisa’s EPositive epos system in the move. The store has been shortlisted as Best Large Store in the 2014 Convenience Retail Awards.

Owner Richard Williams said: “We decided to move over to Nisa because the delivery service is superb and we wanted to expand our range of products available for the consumer.

“The retail, store and fresh food development managers are all very good at making us feel welcome into the company. The new imagery will also give the store an uplift to make it even more inviting and welcoming for our customers.”

The group has also recruited two stores based at the University of York with a combined turnover of £3m a year, representing Nisa’s education campus outlets.

One store is based at the university campus Market Square, with a turnover of £2.3m, the second is a smaller outlet at Halifax College with a turnover of £600,000.

A third store, based at the establishment’s Heslington East campus, is currently in the pipeline, Nisa reports.