Have you ever been to Europe and gone grocery shopping and thought how much better and easier it was that they sell alcohol in the supermarket – and wondered why our major chains don’t do it here (ALDI’s hit and miss alcohol selection excepted)?
Well, I finally made it to Central West Plaza in Braybrook the other week and guess what - there is an alcohol aisle in the Coles. No separate shopfront. No separate transaction. No forgetting your other half wanted you to grab a six pack.
Is this happening commonly in Coles supermarkets or is Braybrook setting the trend (must admit I don’t get to Coles that often)?
As for Central West Plaza itself, I can’t say it’s the most architecturally interesting set up – the plaza is basically a high-roofed warehouse with shops built in – concrete flooring and walls that don’t reach the ceiling. There are several other shops, including a deli, bakery, butchers, Aldi etc but the overall effect is ‘spartan’.
Someone has told me that the plaza site used to be part of an airforce base….. looking into that.
No, first I have seen, and I visit other modern Coles stores. You are right, more Euro style. Not a bad thing necessarily, but it does make alcohol slightly more accessible/visible to children/minors perhaps.
Good thinking I say. Who wants to enrage a (possible drunk) bogan by making them go through two separate check outs?
Speaking of the wonders of local shopping centres, the regular “baby show” at Sunshine Plaza is quite something. My words cannot do it justice.
Madge, I just noticed a baby show poster yesterday and wondered what it was about ….. I don’t have kids but is the idea that someone decides which baby is cutest or something….
No kids either, but the bizarre spectacle I was misfortunate enough to witness was far worse than what I could have imagined. It filled with me with sadness and disgust, almost to the point of being compelled to intervene and ask the “judges”, aka distributers of cheap plastic trophies to parents who paid to enter their children in arbitrary categories pertaining to “baby beauty”, yet appearing to have little disposable income, why they thought they were in the best positon to pass judgement on the babies of others.
The only answer that sprung to mind, was that they came from the Fat Bastard school of thought, that babies are the “other, other white meat”.