New ‘curated’ store Woolworths wants you to shop at three times a day

Benedict Brook
JULY 20, 2018
news.com.au

WOOLIES has quietly opened a new type of store that you’ll barely recognise. It hopes it will fundamentally change the way you shop.

VERY quietly, supermarket giant Woolworths has opened a new concept store which, it hopes, will fundamentally change the way we shop with the retailer. Breaking from the trend of shopping at Woolies once a week, the store is designed to drag you in as much as three times a day. 

Opened last month, the Woolworths Metro store on Sydney’s heaving Pitt St Mall has been inspired by retailers on the choked streets of Hong Kong. Far from being a one-stop destination for your pantry staples, it has a “curated range” to keep you coming back for more, the company says. 

The traditional deli counter has been binned, replaced by a large kitchen serving everything from piping hot roast dinners and red curries, to poke bowls and bespoke salads. 

Located underground in what was the men’s floor of struggling US fashion retailer Forever 21, it’s smaller than a usual supermarket. You’ll barely find loo roll, but if you want hemp powder, it’s here in abundance.  

Woolies wants you to linger too, with a cafe, indoor seating area with phone chargers and microwaves and a sandwich press so you can even cook your own food and hang out by the fresh produce.

Woolworths’ Metro division managing director Steve Greentree told news.com.au the store was “new and different, not traditional” and was serving as a testbed with the best ideas likely to crop up in larger suburban supermarkets.

But there’s a price to pay with everyday groceries, such as Corn Flakes and Vegemite, costing more than at your average Woolworths store.

The opening of the new concept Sydney branch comes as Coles announced on Thursday it would open its first convenience-sized store in Melbourne’s ritzy eastern suburbs by the end of the year. But they’ll be playing catch-up with Woolworths now having 50 Metro-branded mini stores under its belt. 

SURPRISING BESTSELLER

Mr Greentree said the new stores didn’t particularly see Coles as a competitor; rather it is in a battle royal with cafes and food outlets.

“If you come into the city wanting lunch at the moment, you have to queue up at a food court but we have an offer that’s significantly cheaper,” he told news.com.au.

“We used to use a supermarket once or twice a week. What we’re building with this store is somewhere we serve you three times a day,” he said.

“The first thing you see when you walk in is a cafe where you can get breakfast and then as you go through the day you can get lunch and then, as you head home, there’s a dinner solution.”

And if you think Australians would turn their collective noses up at a supermarket flat white, think again. While Coke or bananas might be the top selling product in most Woolies, here takeaway coffee is by far the most popular single item.

“I guess there is a snobbery with coffee, but what we’re serving is Vittoria coffee and Vittoria do all the training for our baristas, but it’s affordable,” Mr Greentree said.

INSPIRED BY HONG KONG

Woolies’ dream customer could well be Kirrily, an office worker in the CBD who spoke to news.com.au after she picked up a Thai red curry: “It’s easy and convenient. I work around the corner so I can just run here, pick up some lunch and my groceries too.”

Woolies’ Metro stores aren’t themselves new; it’s opened 27 from scratch and converted the rest from existing smaller supermarkets. But the Pitt St store is the start of a new concept, Mr Greentree said.

“This store is a combination of everything we’ve learnt on a journey of 27 other stores as to how we get people through the front door and the food we serve,” he said. 

Inspiration had come from the UK and US but also from Hong Kong, where supermarkets are adept at serving customers living cheek-by-jowl.