As a Tesco worker I am sorry you feel Tesco staff are horrible, We have lovely staff in our store and nothing is too much trouble, we are sadly under a lot of pressure at the moment with staff not being replaced when they leave, and having to do the job of two, and until recently it was frowned upon to interact with customers as it was seen as time wasting, that has changed because they have realised it is not all about money and is about customers, we are only a small store and know a lot of our customers by name and are considered as a friendly store by our customers, who don't like going to the larger Extra store 4 miles away.
There are plans to build another store 12 miles away and everyone! is up in arms about it because of what it will do to the local shops, the person who started the petition and is the face of the campain shops in our store twice a week, double standards or nimbyism!!!!!
Also a lot of our regular customers are from this town and they say they can't wait for the store to be built so they don't have to trudge 12 miles to our store.
I personally use this town to get my meat from the butchers and veg from the veg shop on a regular basis.
I wouldn't defend Tesco taking over the world because it does look like that sometimes, however when you look at the supermarkets after they have been built they are packed with locals, as long as people will shop in them Tesco will build them.
In Totnes I think it is they have refused any major supermarkets prefering the local shops, very admirable, but it is a very wealthy town with lots of 2nd homes so they can afford to shop local.
Our local Sainsburys has a different class of people who will tell you they only shop there because you get a better class of people in Sainsburys !!!!!!!!!!!!!!! yep heard it myself, Tesco is perceived to attract rif raf. and people would rather spend more in Sainsburys than shop with the hoy paloy.
We have a planning application in from Asda at the moment, this keeps getting thrown out as we have 9 supermarkets all ready but they keep coming back saying they will give the town more and more money, building roads, housing etc.
They say they will bring custom to the town centre, but what else will they be building, Restaurants, and shops, how is that helping local shops?
Nope I think the time has almost come where the country is saturated with supermarkets and we need to stop and build no more.
Also part of the death of the high street is the dear old internet, how many of us buy most of what we need on the internet, and be honest, rather than the hassle of trapsing around the shops and paying extrotionate car parking fees.
