ALDI for Callan - again!!

foxcoverteddy

You are wrong premier man, it will be like disneyland for a few weeks, it will be the main topic of conversation, you think about it the people of Callan have never had such freedom of choice, well not unless they travelled to Kilkenny or clonmel.
Just think that we are not permitted to have a Tesco in the county, doesn't that do anything to you, we are deprived in a free state, that can't be right.
It is like the new leader of north korea getting what was it ten or eleven holes in one, bet you haven't done that, freedom man is a great thing.
If you read some of the other threads there are responsible people who appear to be lving in Disneyland.
See you in feckin aldi's, good luck, they sell golf balls sometimes.

Dan Jaman

Is Disney coming to Callan?
Damn, nobody tells me anything.
I'd imagine Disney would want to set up in Westcourt, where there's an auld empty unit or two and plenty of room for the rides.

foxcoverteddy

Crazy golf down by the abbey? Could have a train going between westcourt Aldi and the Abbey, bags I the one in the mickey mouse costume

foxcoverteddy

Well almost there, the Aldi site looks rather stylish to say the least, one hopes the traffic flow works.
I am told that when Aldi open their doors on the first morning there are some great bargains to bed had, though they are usually limited and as a result people have been known to start queueing at some unearthly hour.
It is only what I have been told.
One good thing I will not have to look at the cost of some of supervalu so called offers, there are tea bags if you buy two small boxes it works out about 1 euro cheaper than the box which is equivalent to the two small ones.
This is really crazy, it was large was always best, same can apply to coffee offers, which is not good economics.
Now they play hide and seek with items, offers may not be close to the normal priced items, will they change?
I am hoping so as it is my belief we do need a superv alu with Aldi
So get yourself fit for the great day, see you there.
Foxy

foxcoverteddy

Hi everyone, well before I go on switch to Aldi on facebook and see the prizes some of us could win, 100 euro a day vouchers, only minimum details to enter, worth it, if you aren't in you can't win, they have been telling me that on the Lottery for the last 10 years, before that it was football Pools, I a\m still skint, but someone has to win, it could be you.
Well there seems to be a lot of advertisin g going on for our store being it is Aldi's 100th store in Ireland, wasn't the wait worth it.
I am getting all tingly thinking of pushing me trolley round, well tell you one thing if you haven't shopped Aldi before be careful, there are so many bargains and items cheaper than you would believe it is difficult not to throw them all in the trolley.
Do not worry Aldi do not run special offers then put prices up, it is everyday low prices, I was trying to think is there anything I would not recommend, actually no , the Fair Trade tea makes a good cuppa, Diplomat, n ow instant coffee I have not tried, but will do when my stock of special offers runs out.
Biscuits, cakes and bread, I know what i said about local shops but as someone pointed out yesterday, not everyone can afford the price, well I have been hard-up and appreciate that, in fact it was super to be told, so the price of biscuits etc is, well watch your figure, Lynch's bread, yes Autosport haven't forgot your comment, is something else and at 99c brilliant valu, only downside is no hot rolls etc.
Vegetables come at really low prices, they are permanent low prices so do not over buy, the only thing I would say they tend not to have the same selection as Lidl, I try to buy organic but is there much difference, who can tell.
Dairy things, none of this buy four to get a reasonable price for yogurts, meat etc well they do not have a butcher so it is all pre-packed but quality.
Cat and doggy things very good prices, I could almost write a book going round Aldi, then there is the centre isle goodies, you won't believe this but as I shop frequently in Aldi, I go in and have no intention of buying thins other than food, then come out with a trolley filled with things we did not need before we went in and could not do without coming home, just take it easy.
As you might have guessed I am pro Aldi we have to move with the times, but answer this what comes next?
So my friends thank you for all the support and even those who might not agreed with the thread, but will no doubt end up in Aldi, a very big thank you, yes NHG you really were brilliant and Dan so funny. Autosport terrific.
We probably haven't quite got to the end but it has been fun, Foxy

Dan Jaman

foxcoverteddy wrote: »

but answer this what comes next?

Why, Lidl of course.

Phil MaCrackin

The latest I heard is that the council have bought a strip of land from the owner of the field between the meadows and the bungalow beside Aldi... They're gonna push back that stone wall so there'll be a continuous footpath from the meadows all the way down to Aldi. Pity about the priests house where it is, that's the only bottleneck now on the lane......

foxcoverteddy

Dan Jaman, you are probably on the right track, Aldi will need some competition to keep them on their toes, the way things are going our current supermarket will not rise to the occasion.
I think it sad and feel sorry for the staff who in the main do try their best to help. It should not be this way, it may well be Irish shoppers now demand more and are no longer prepared to put up with the old regimes.
The small shops have really gone, they have had their day, same as street markets, well small town ones.
Yes supermarkets were a big leap forward, and now Aldi and Lidl have taken us a further step forward, where to next?
Who is going to predict the future?
Foxy

Autosport

Foxy I'm gonna miss you talking about Aldi/lidl and Tesco and all their offers and what not. I might actually pop in when Aldi open but I will always be a Tesco shopper. So many of them in Waterford I'm spoilt for choice and its certainly strange that Kilkenny didn't get one but such as life.

foxcoverteddy

Yes Autosport, nor can we understand why the council would not let Tesco into the county, after all we elect the counmcil and the voters opinion should count for something, apparently not in Kilkenny.
Hope you have registered for your chance to win 100Euro, you could win the big one .
I am really a Sainsbury shopper, lived near Tesco Head Office in Cheshunt, they had M&S next door, who was in M&S?
Tesco isn't bad, plenty of choice, sell by dates always look good, though I still think Aldi and Lidl have the edge on them, I feel that we are paying for name branding in Tesco when probably the same factory is turning out things for Aldi and Lidl under different names.
Any way we may soon popping over the water from Waterford for a quick shop in the UK, hoping Flybe do well.
Take great care, regards Foxy

Threadhead

I think you should probably consider that there are a HUGE amount of people in Kilkenny who don't want a Tesco. It's not as simple as saying, we vote the council in and the voters opinion should count for something. They do. There are members of Kilkenny borough council and county council who are anti Tesco and represent members of the public who are. And vice versa of course. A bit of balance please. It's not as simple as saying we all want a Tesco and the council won't let us.

Cabaal

Threadhead wrote: »

I think you should probably consider that there are a HUGE amount of people in Kilkenny who don't want a Tesco. It's not as simple as saying, we vote the council in and the voters opinion should count for something. They do. There are members of Kilkenny borough council and county council who are anti Tesco and represent members of the public who are. And vice versa of course. A bit of balance please. It's not as simple as saying we all want a Tesco and the council won't let us.

I'd tend to agree,
Whilst there perhaps is a vested interest in Dunnes protecting their business this alone would not stop tesco coming to Kilkenny city and county.

At the end of the day Tesco is not the be all and end all of everything like some people like to believe in Kilkenny, this is very similar to how some people view M&S in Waterford.

Lets not forget that bringing the likes of a Tesco Extra into a area can seriously screw up smaller business, there's a reason why the likes of http://www.tescopoly.org/ was started in the uk.

foxcoverteddy

of course there are always two sides to any discussion, you could without doubt be correct in your assumption regarding Tesco.
However, do we want a bustling city with full employment and untold numbers of visitors descending on the Mecca of the South East or are we going to jog along content with what we have.
Think of the shops we do not have apart from Tesco, Debenhams, PC World or curry's, M&S, Harvey Norman, Iceland, of course the arguement being we do not want to be like other towns, ask the unemployed the same thing.
Why are people from kilkenny going to Carlow and Waterford and the Kildare Village, think about it, more choice better value, which as much as I love them small shops cannot compete with.
It is fine if you have enough money to support such luxuries, yes so many people are shopping in Aldi and Lidl why, a dam sight cheaper than your Dunnes, Supervalu and also Tesco.
We need two towns the historic one for quick visits by coach, the castle and the high st and maybe the new brewery centre, as a thought perhaps we could give the visitors a rather nifty high powered nip so that they started to throw money around.
Then the town for the proper shoppers us who live here 24/7, I agree it is a very diverse situation b ut honestly would a tourist go across the bridge to john s Street, compared to the high st it is a tip and does not show the true nature of our city or does it, is the high st just a charade?
I think this is too big for the council to come up with an answer, in truth we need a tram system to get from McDonagh to Loughboy via the Waterford Road, I know recession but think of the future stop living in the past or the now broaden your outlook.
Foxy

foxcoverteddy

Cabaal, is not the old story Tesco and the major supermarkets are so successful that there is this back lash by groups who are failing to see the march of time, I nwever want the days to come back where one had to go to different counters in the same shop for different things, tin goods over there, bacon another one chees and butter that way.
Might have been idyllic before the world war of 39 -45, the whole world changed, Tesco is brilliant, yes the small shops suffer, who do you want rich small shop keepers and poor shoppers, or even richer supermarkets and customers who get a fair deal and fresher food.
It goes on my friend if people want to stick their heads in the ground let them their choice, but give me the brave new world with all it's warts and bumps.
Sorry, i feel so sorry for people whio want to keep us in the past. Foxy

Dan Jaman

Cabaal wrote: »

I'd tend to agree,
Whilst there perhaps is a vested interest in Dunnes protecting their business this alone would not stop tesco coming to Kilkenny city and county.

At the end of the day Tesco is not the be all and end all of everything like some people like to believe in Kilkenny, this is very similar to how some people view M&S in Waterford.

Lets not forget that bringing the likes of a Tesco Extra into a area can seriously screw up smaller business, there's a reason why the likes of http://www.tescopoly.org/ was started in the uk.

I went into Tesco in Clonmel, seriously expecting their prices to be similar to the offers on the Tesco UK site.
Were they hell. The usual rip-off.

foxcoverteddy

Dan Jarman, don't forget you have to take note of the exchange rate and due to the fact it can fluctuate stores do have to protect themselves. at one tim e some had dual priced tickets showing sterling and euro, of course some charged a lot more in euro very few were lillywhite.
It is like magazines that come in, they add the exchange rate then the extra VAT, igt can be cheaper to buy them direct from the UK or not at all.
If you have some facts of the cost in sterling and euro perhaps we could kn ock something together.
I have just come back from town Kilkenny I went shortly after my last post, the top of the market cross car park had about 8 or 10 cars, the whole place looked dead in gthe high st, one of the shop keepers said there is no one about.
So very sad and of course the empty shops, we need shoppers and it matters little how we get them, another bit one other store I went into for a printer, I wanted a cheap one, there wasn't a price to be seen on any of them, good way for selling, the ndext guy wanted to charge me the pre sale price, oh dear.
I wanted bags for my cleaner, two stores no names we don't stock that brand, one did at least say go to Wallaces and what a joy to be greeted with a big hello and smile, not a problem for my bags, if you need cheering up Wallaces is the place.
Foxy

Dan Jaman

foxcoverteddy wrote: »

Wallaces and what a joy to be greeted with a big hello and smile, not a problem for my bags, if you need cheering up Wallaces is the place.
Foxy

Yes, Wallaces is a great little shop for domestic spares, but if you have to buy a few it adds up. My rule of thumb is that if the local supplier can get within 20% of the cost of getting the stuff mail-order, I'll buy locally.
Walsh's can do it for car spares and other items, so why can't others?

Shelflife

foxcoverteddy wrote: »

Cabaal, is not the old story Tesco and the major supermarkets are so successful that there is this back lash by groups who are failing to see the march of time, I nwever want the days to come back where one had to go to different counters in the same shop for different things, tin goods over there, bacon another one chees and butter that way.
Might have been idyllic before the world war of 39 -45, the whole world changed, Tesco is brilliant, yes the small shops suffer, who do you want rich small shop keepers and poor shoppers, or even richer supermarkets and customers who get a fair deal and fresher food.
It goes on my friend if people want to stick their heads in the ground let them their choice, but give me the brave new world with all it's warts and bumps.
Sorry, i feel so sorry for people whio want to keep us in the past. Foxy

FCT im confused, you say above that tesco is brilliant and concede that the small shops will suffer but you seem happy enough with that.

You also throw out the quote

or even richer supermarkets and customers who get a fair deal and fresher food.

At least there you concede that the supermarkets are even richer then the greedy shop keepers but you seem to have been brainwashed into thinking that they are cheaper and seriously do you really think that the food is fresher in supermarkets?

You eulogise over the small shops in your town like the baker and fishmonger and butcher and how great they are and in the next breath say that tesco are great and then concede the small shops will close.

You also say that you would love to see small specialist shops but how do you expect a shop like this to survive in callan if you allow the likes of tesco in as well.


"who do you want rich small shop keepers and poor shoppers"

as if all shop owners are greedy people ripping off their customers. sorry but thats a terrible insult to the hardworking retailers out there.

You seem to think that tesco brings in new jobs, the general consesus is that for every 100 jobs tesco brings in 150 are are lost in the locality. this is borne out in the UK as well where local opposition to new tesco shops is rife and the heart is torn out of many british towns.

FCT yes change is inevitable and we must move with the times, however not all change is good and the demise of the local butcher,baker fishmonger may well result in cheaper products but there is also the dilution in quality and choice, yes even choice,you will no longer be able to get your shoulder of pork or your herrings or your flourly bap every weekend because tesco and aldi dont do them.

but sure what the hell you can buy something that you didnt want cheaper.

foxcoverteddy

Yes that was a brilliant post, I understand fully what you are saying, however, of course supermarkets will get richer and the small shop keeper will eventually disappear, well not altogether some will survive.
Yes I do believe supermarket food is fresher than the small grocer, despite coming from a central warehouse, you take the general grocer who does fruit and veg on the side, is it fresh can he afford to discard it, no.
The British tale of woe is aimed at Tesco because it survived and prospered, the truth is Britain was known as a nation of shopkeepers, you had corner shops coming out of your ears, street markets abounded in every town, then came the Sunday market, it wasn't all Tesco that brought the pack of cards down.
The stop smoking brigade helped the small shopkeeper to pack it in, and he in turn tried selling groceries and bits and pieces. You have only to look here at home, it certainly isn't Tesco in Kilkenny.
Will be back later, Foxy

foxcoverteddy

Aldi coming to Callan is not going to close any small shop, you may ask why, well what has Supervalu been doing, under cutting the small shopkeeper, long hours, discounting items that the small shop keeper could not compete with, not content to sell groceries etc, they went into magazines and papers cigarettes and national lottery, if a small trader is on a rocky road who is the culprit?
So any one saying it was Aldi that did that think again, before advancing on Tesco the most hated man in aviation is our Michael O' Leary, we should be cheering the man, he is a national treasure, but at every move people condem him, he has bought cheap air travel to m illions who otherwise would not have been able to afford it, yes he runs a tight ship as the saying goes, pity our government couldn't do the same.
It is said he is sitting on a very large pile of cash, hasn't he just invested in a new fleet of Boeing 737's, that my friends is success, I salute the man.
Now Tesco, did Tesco decimate the heart of every town in Britain, no they did not, Britain had too many shops selling groceries etc, some were large concerns, I will name a few MacFisheries, Dewhurst the butcher, Hemmings Bakery, David Greig's, Frost's, Walton's greengrocery, International Stores supermarket, Antony Jackson ditto, Finefare ditto, Gateway ditto Safeway supermarket, Woolworth's, Kwik Save, these were not your corner stores, a lot had gone before Tesco arrived, it was the changing face of the public's shopping habits.
Tesco is Britains Michael o'Leary, such success brings out the knocker's.
I understand people's sentiment for the old style of things, which is fine if you can afford it, most of us cannot.
So enjoy Aldi it is the new face of shopping in Callan.
So Dunnes Stores have played no part in the demise of small shops?

Dan Jaman

The only reason O'Leary and Ryanair exist is because the European air market was de-regulated years back and he jumped right in. O'Leary isn't a magician and there are others who've done the same in budget air travel.
Freddie Laker tried to do the same but was shafted by British Airways, decades ago - he was too soon, unfortunately.
One thing I'll say in favour of Ryanair, if they (or someone like them) didn't exist, Aer Lingus would still be charging arms and legs for short flights (having said that, you try and get a last -minute flight on Ryanair and see how much they stiff you for).
All the same, I'll still fly Aer Lingus in preference to Ryanair as I resent being treated like cattle, and AL retain at least some measure of decency towards the paying passenger.

foxcoverteddy

Dan Jaman, yes quite right, but it matters not Michael jumped in where others fear to tread, the number of defunct UK airlines, like Laker, British Caledonian etc all tried but none of them was a Michael O Leary. You have joined the band wagon "He knows when to shaft you", maybe he is in business to provide a service, a fleet of 200 odd aircraft say's he is right, and as you say without him you could be paying an arm and a leg.
Isn't this the same as Callan, Supervalu would have continued on their merry way charging as much as possible, Aldi have spoilt the game Dan, who is going to benefit?
Will anyone say oh dear I can't shop in those cheap shops they are below my standard, not to-day Dan very few people can afford to spend their money that way.

Dan Jaman

There's another reason I won't fly with Ryanair - look up 'fuel emergency, ryanair' on google and see how crappitly he runs it.

Phil MaCrackin

Theres a group of workmen at aldi installing the suspended price tag holder boards over the aisles today!

foxcoverteddy

Well done Phil, in case anyone doesn't know it was Phil who started this thread, which has given us a great deal of fun to say the least, what next Lidl?

Phil MaCrackin

LOL!! I never though it was gonna explode like it did!! Fair dues to you Fox, you kept it going!! I wonder what will we chat about once it opens! I see their initial deals is some gardening tools and an electric heater... Thats what on the ad in the kilkenny reporter this week anyways!

foxcoverteddy

Dan that is the last of your worries, he hasn't lost a plane yet, well not true he did have a total loss but no one was injured, he also has had a few tail strikes, one in Poland the other day, they had a eight hour wait for another plane.
He is too shrewd to run out of fuel, and in all honesty cattle would not be allowed on a state of the art 737, it is slightly better than the train trip from Dub to kilkenny in the rush hour.
Expect Aldi to be stacking before long, i forgot no one mentions Quinnsworth or Crazy Prices which must have had some effect on the small shopkeepers, L&N in Kilkenny was alwys busy, well we will enjoy Aldi's 100th store, have you done the facebook thing to win 100 euro? Remember it could be you
Regards Foxy

Phil MaCrackin

I saw a 40' container lorry in there yesterday!! maybe they're stocking the frozen goods already! I didn;t notice if it was a refrigerated lorry tho

Threadhead

Make sure ye get a photo of yerselves cutting the ribbon at the grand opening and post it up here.

It would be a fitting culmination to this thread.

Phil MaCrackin

I don't think anybody knows who anybody else is on this thread!!!