Poundland East Dulwich soon to be replaced by Tesco Express

[David Peckham]

30 minutes ago, Sue said:

I was mainly buying them for the nice plain boxes, so now I just put other tissues into the old Waitrose boxes 🤣)

I used to buy a brand of olive oil called 'Il Casolare'. It was unfiltered, often on offer in Sainsbury's and came in a really nice bottle with a stopper.

When it was finished, I'd soak the label off, fill it with Morrison's own-brand vermouth and use it for cooking as it lasts longer than keeping wine open. One night there was very little else left to drink, so we got into it - I told people it was a difficult to find artisanal brand I'd brought back from Barcelona and that it should be pronounced 'Vermut'.

People loved it.

I gave away a couple of bottles as Christmas presents the next year.

[Penguin68]

As Occado source from Waitrose, and were their only deliverer at one stage, and as Waitrose do now deliver it may be they feel their reach in ED is sufficient to mean having a local outlet would not gain them sufficient additional sales to be cost effective. The movement to delivery rather than physical shopping during Covid has I believe substantially changed the grocery economics. So it may be that the High Street dynamic for physical shops has now changed. 

[David Peckham]

Ocado stopped sourcing from Waitrose a few years ago. They now source from M&S and general brands. Waitrose have their own delivery service now. I don't know how well served SE22 is by it.

Ocado offers for new customers are, or certainly were, really good, particularly in the run up to Christmas. I think I got 20%/15%/10% up to a maximum of £100 spend off my first three deliveries with no delivery charge or commitment to sign up for further deliveries.

There wasn't a time limit, IIRC, so it was a great way of restocking heavy store cupboard basics and stuff for the freezer.

[Insuflo]

I’m not sure home delivery will replace physical supermarkets. I got the impression that they’re generally loss- making for the retailers and they’d much prefer to encourage customers back to the shops.

I read somewhere that the typical Ocado order was around £100 but costs Ocado £120 to fulfill. It works for M&S because they have roped Ocado into a contract where Ocado carry the bulk of the loss.

[Sue]

4 hours ago, David Peckham said:

Waitrose have their own delivery service now. I don't know how well served SE22 is by it.

I'm off North Cross Road, and they deliver there.

4 hours ago, David Peckham said:

Ocado offers for new customers are, or certainly were, really good, particularly in the run up to Christmas. I think I got 20%/15%/10% up to a maximum of £100 spend off my first three deliveries with no delivery charge or commitment to sign up for further deliveries.

There wasn't a time limit, IIRC, so it was a great way of restocking heavy store cupboard basics and stuff for the freezer.

Ocado do have good offers, and yes obviously they are great value if you can stock up on things which keep.

After doing some calculations, I just couldn't make it financially viable, even with what seemed like a very good offer.

I think there must have been a minimum spend, and I couldn't find enough I wanted to buy from Ocado  to reach it, even though my Waitrose delivery is often pushing £100 when I'm stocking up on things.

I'll try again at some point if they haven't given up on me.

I used to spend ages comparing prices of things between the different supermarkets, until I belatedly realised that my time was worth more than the relatively  miniscule amounts I was potentially saving 🤣

Edited 6 hours ago by Sue

[ianr]

On 19/07/2025 at 14:57, Cameron Chiu said:

Does anyone have an update on if this is happening?

ED is included in the 17 August closure set (or just possibly 15 August, depending on which part of the page you trust more) listed at https://metro.co.uk/2025/07/25/full-list-25-poundland-stores-confirmed-close-august-23753048/.

Here incidentally are some snippets from their annual reports, at
https://find-and-update.company-information.service.gov.uk/company/02495645/filing-history.

2022: " during the period we opened 41 stores and closed 43 loss-making/under-performing stores.  At the period-end we were trading from 821 stores in the UK, IoM and ROI.
...
"We renogotiated 82 leases in the year, saving on average 45% versus the prior lease agreement..."

2023: "We also continued to improve our market footprint through sourcing better store locations, opening 53 and closing 51 stores during the year."

2024:  "The ex-Wilco stores acquired in the prior year have formed a core part of this strategy to expand our store network.  We favour quality over quantity and during the period we opened 84 stores and closed 71 loss-making/under-performing ones."

Edited 15 minutes ago by ianr