From Colin Macleod, retail controller, CI Co-operative Society.
IT is a truism that all news is good news, and so it is with a recent comment by Meridian in Under the Clock.

One must admit, however, that it might have been even better if the comments about the situation at the Grand Marché in St Helier had been put in context, and better still if someone had perhaps asked this organisation for an explanation.

But, such are the ways of the media, especially in columns which are written in the comfort zone of anonymity, that this is rarely the case. Therefore, I have to resort to a letter to you, Mr Editor, to do what the multi-personality of Meridian failed so conspicuously to achieve and put the situation in the framework of the ongoing refurbishment at our major town store. We are well into the process, to adopt his or her phrase, of ‘sorting this supermarket out’ a balanced comment could have at least acknowledged this.

 The changes being made at St Helier’s Grand Marché are part of a long-planned refurbishment which was based on what our members (the customers) had been telling us they wanted. The past two years has seen a phenomenal growth in trading, partly through normal business expansion, and partly in response to developments within other supermarket companies. In response to that we are installing three extra tills in order to cope better, and we are a long way through a major redesign of the main selling area, not only to increase space for all our areas of sales, but also to ensure better availability of goods through all our opening hours. Part of this new design will include a full-service fresh fish counter and an in-store butcher.

This increase in business has been particularity evident in the pharmacy, so this has been moved to a larger area. This will provide greater space and, therefore, an opportunity to stock a larger range of health products than can be managed at present. A larger dispensary area will be provided, giving more people the chance to combine collection of prescriptions with the convenience of supermarket shopping.
Inevitably any refurbishment activity will include a certain amount of disruption and, much as we hate to admit it in public, we do not have a magic wand that can introduce such changes overnight. I am afraid it does take a certain amount of time. By working overnight and on Sundays we have done our best to minimise the impact on our customers.

Meridian might be interested to know that our regular customers have not been slow in coming forward to congratulate us on these changes as they are taking shape. In a sense one could argue that these favourable comments are hardly surprising, as these changes are precisely those that most of our customers have asked us to instigate. I would like therefore, to take this opportunity to thank all our customers for their patience. If some, including the current incarnation of Meridian, find the process of change annoying, then I can only apologise and say that all this activity should be over by the end of the month. With luck and a following wind, maybe earlier.

Finally I would like to invite Meridian to come and examine the changes when they have been completed. I will be delighted to show him or her around.
27 Charing Cross,
St Helier.