Day in Supermarket - Arcadian Centre - 23rd March 2015

After going out on a training course at the Radisson Blu Hotel, I decided to head to a Chinese supermarket at the city centre of Birmingham.

Day in Supermarket is a local Chinese supermarket in Birmingham that serves to the Birmingham community and beyond. It's one of the well known supermarkets in Birmingham with Wing Yip as its main rival.

There are two branches and I headed to the busier one at the Arcadian.

So, what is the supermarket like? The criteria is as follows.

1. Clean - Generally clean with items stocked well.
2. Friendly staff - Generally yes and are trilingual - they can speak English, Cantonese and Mandarin. I spoke to them in Cantonese. Could do a bit better with greeting customers but they do pack bags for you without asking!
3. Aisle width - narrow I'm afraid. The trolleys are a lot smaller than ones find in the more traditional British supermarkets. Two small trolleys side by side are a struggle! It definitely reminds me of Hong Kong supermarkets.
4. Everything I was looking for was in stock - Mostly. It's great to find Oriental products and what you want to find is pretty much in stock. If you're looking for dairy products as an example, best head to a British supermarket.
5. Extras: pharmacy/opticians/specialist food/petrol station - Apart from specialist Oriental products, there's no extra perks.
6. Fresh produce with long sell-by dates - Variable. Stocks not on special offer have long sell-by dates. However,  if they are on special offer, be wary that products are close to their sell-by dates. These include noodles and sauces. In addition, they have an "Out of Date" stock section. Not very appealing to me....
7. Opening Hours - Reasonable but could do better. 9am to 6pm Mondays to Saturdays and 10am to 6pm Sundays. Very good opening hours on Sunday as it's more the size of a convenience store.
8. Speed of till-processing - four manned tills available. Fast, efficient and they pack bags for you without asking. Could be more friendly.
9. Self-service tills available - No, why need them?
10. Parking facilities - sorry, no parking available. Best bet is to go for one of the car parks in the city centre.
11. Value for money - Generally okay, they do provide reasonable prices and around a third to a half of the products price match or are cheaper than Wing Yip in Nechells. However, if you want to compare like for like prices for specialist Oriental products compared to the Big Four Supermarkets, then Day in Supermarket wins hands down.
12. Organic produce - er... they don't specifically state so... I'm guessing no.
13. Cash machine or cash back - No cash machine available. You need to go to the other end of the Arcadian to find cash machines. You could pay by card, but it requires a £5 minimum purchase!
14. Pedestrian access - yes and step free.

Overall, the Day in Supermarket in the Arcadian Centre is a good medium sized supermarket with many products available. It's very compact for its size and they offer free calendars towards the end of the year.

Photo courtesy of The Local Data Company

Rating: 6.5 out of 10 (-0.5 for lack of some essential stock (dairy products as an example), -0.5 for greeting, -0.5 for parking facilities, -1 for special offers and out of stock section (not offering long sell by dates), -0.5 for opening hours, -0.5 for minimum purchase for use of credit/debit cards