Pet Hates

[IR35 Avoider]

I had never been in an Asda until a couple of years ago when I was doing a bit of work near Newcastle. I needed a couple of things and saw an Asda as I was driving back to the hotel and popped in. Never again, what a tulip shop, tulip customers, tulip products and I thought German supermarkets were bad

My wife insists on Asda, because it's cheapest. I hate going there because it's in a slummy neighbourhood and it's the only one of six supermarkets we could go to where we have to pay for parking. (Though cost is refunded at the till.)

We have a Waitrose at the end of our street. If Waitrose is so good, how come every time I buy a loaf of their own-brand bread, it tastes stale and hard?

Waitrose took over the store from Safeway. Don't laugh, but the store was relatively posh when it was a Safeway. Waitrose downgraded it, ripping out expensive and attractive stone tile flooring that had only been installed a couple of years earlier, replacing them with plain white vinyl squares. Safeway had an extensive takeaway section (including a huge Pizza oven where you could get custom-made pizzas) which Waitrose got rid of. In every way I can think of, the takeover made the place worse. I really wonder what people see in Waitrose.

[BrilloPad]

My wife insists on Asda, because it's cheapest. I hate going there because it's in a slummy neighbourhood and it's the only one of six supermarkets we could go to where we have to pay for parking. (Though cost is refunded at the till.)

We have a Waitrose at the end of our street. If Waitrose is so good, how come every time I buy a loaf of their own-brand bread, it tastes stale and hard?

Waitrose took over the store from Safeway. Don't laugh, but the store was relatively posh when it was a Safeway. Waitrose downgraded it, ripping out expensive and attractive stone tile flooring that had only been installed a couple of years earlier, replacing them with plain white vinyl squares. Safeway had an extensive takeaway section (including a huge Pizza oven where you could get custom-made pizzas) which Waitrose got rid of. In every way I can think of, the takeover made the place worse. I really wonder what people see in Waitrose.

Dont know about the supermarkets - but Ocado are brilliant!

[voodooflux]

Dont know about the supermarkets - but Ocado are brilliant!

WHS

[moorfield]

WHS

WHS++


Argos is my worst nightmare. Once, when I was briefly on the bench, I went to Argos one afternoon. I very nearly committed suicide.

[AtW]

Waitrose downgraded it, ripping out expensive and attractive stone tile flooring that had only been installed a couple of years earlier, replacing them with plain white vinyl squares.

It's not your bathroom - it's a shop to buy stuff in. Hint - maybe Safeway failed in their business (if it was successful it would still be around) because of those tiles.

My local high street happens to have had Safeway too, it was then bought by Morrisons and then sold to tacky Somersfield - after that when Waitrose moved in it seemed like Xmas. Not sure about flooring - I go to shop to buy stuff, so I look at shelves, not floor. Then again I don't with a wife though.

[IR35 Avoider]

It's not your bathroom - it's a shop to buy stuff in. Hint - maybe Safeway failed in their business (if it was successful it would still be around) because of those tiles.

My local high street happens to have had Safeway too, it was then bought by Morrisons and then sold to tacky Somersfield - after that when Waitrose moved in it seemed like Xmas. Not sure about flooring - I go to shop to buy stuff, so I look at shelves, not floor. Then again I don't with a wife though.

It presumably makes commercial sense to have nice decor, which is why Waitrose put white vinyl on their floors rather than leaving them as grey concrete. In this case they spent money in order to make it look worse. How does that make commercial sense? (OK, they have a brand identity which presumably governs the interior decor in there stores as well, but imposing it in this case was vandalism.)

In fairness I should say that the Waitrose is still nicer (in terms of decor) than any of the several other supermarkets we could go to, it's not bad in absolute terms.

It does matter what things look like. I'm sure you wouln't want the appearance of every public place reduced to its cheapest equivalent. I'm still seething because a couple of mature trees outside my flats were removed by the management company. The reason given was that their roots were lifting the brick paving, creating a trip hazard. Why not just lift the bricks, smooth out the area with sand, relay the paving? Would have taken one person half a day to do.

When the company I work at underwent a sort of merger, all sort of interior refurbishment went on prior to the other company moving in. The building, though very nice, was tired inside, so the work did need to be done (unlike in the supermarket case.) However the renovation downgraded the interior of the building a lot. For example, toilets which had been tiled became painted in plain white. I thought at the time that unless cubicles were painted / redecorated on a weekly basis the place would become a disgusting slum, and I was proved right. Previously the reception had looked like something you might expect to see in an advertising agency, right down to having a very beautiful, very tall receptionist, stylishly dressed, with a very posh voice. The refurbished reception looks like something from an industrial estate, cheap and nasty furniture, carpet tiles that soon started lifting at the corners, and the reception staff from the new facilities management company look like prison warders in their blue security guard uniforms.

[Diver]

I hate cold callers at the door, that don't take the hint until you close the door in their face mid sentence

[Bob Dalek]

Ah, but does it sell cheap spanners as per Lidl?

Cheap and good spanners? I doubt it.

[TheBigYinJames]

still if the client was desperate they would take anyone so it did not really matter!

Let's face it - we like to paint ourselves as the bright young techno-things - but in reality, most programmers were the spotty twerps who got picked on at school for lack of personal hygiene, greasy hair, acne, and one muscular wrist. All growed up now, I think a lot of 'computer scientists'* forget that, which is why they don't go to school reunions except to show off how different they are now and hoping to get off with the girl they were too scared and ugly to ask atthe time.

*I carefully let myself out of this category. I was the spotty twerp who did Engineering and not computer science.

[Diver]

I was the school bully