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Do you remember your first ever visit to a supermarket ?

(11 Posts)
pably15 Mon 14-Sept-26 20:55:24

I remember when I was still at school, our local co op changed to self service. as you went in the door there were baskets in a sort of wooden framework...about 16 of them all numbered
you took a basket and put your shopping bag in the space..getting checked out the girl at the desk new what bag to give you....if the baskets were all being used you had to wait your turn...I'd like to see that now...

Cabbie21 Mon 14-Sept-26 20:50:01

I don’t remember my first visit but I remember my parents coming back from their first visit to the new Tesco in 1961, the first outside of the London area and for some years the largest in Europe. I recall them bringing in a couple of cardboard boxes full of tinned stuff. Mum continued to shop locally for everything else.

Oldnproud Mon 14-Sept-26 20:18:02

My first supermarket visit must have been in 1968.
The reason I can date it is because my mum bought me a colouring by numbers toy in the shop, and i remember taking one of the pictures in to school after I had done it, and i was in first year juniors at the time.

JamesandJon33 Mon 14-Sept-26 20:06:58

AGAA4 I fainted three weeks in a row in our local Sainsbury’s, when I was pregnant. I was so embarrassed I went to Tesco for a few months.

M0nica Mon 14-Sept-26 20:03:59

No, recollection whatsoever. Self service sort of crept up on me, probably starting with quite a small corner shop and creeping up. I remember when I went to university the shop nearest my hall of residence was a Co-op self service.

I do remember the first timeI went into a really big supermarket. This, I think, was in the mid 70s, and was an ASDA somewhere near Helensburgh in Scotland, where we were staying with friends. I was gobsmacked by the size and quantity of goods.

I do remember buying 2 large plastic trolley bags there that lasted me well over 20 years before they fell apart. I like to dwell on how many hundreds or even thousands of disposable plastic bags were not used as a result of those bags, is a cosolation when I see the damage those disposable bags have done to the environment.

HowVeryDareYou2 Mon 14-Sept-26 19:54:32

I remember going to Fine Fare with my mum, in 1971. I was about 11 then.

GrandmaKT Mon 14-Sept-26 19:45:41

I remember Lennons - which was all frozen food - a bit like Farmfoods I suppose. It was in the 70s when everyone was buying chest freezers.

petra Mon 14-Sept-26 19:43:25

Victor Values which morphed into Tesco’s. When Jack Cohen said stack em high, sell them cheap he wasn’t joking.

Rocketstop2 Mon 14-Sept-26 19:32:14

OMG AGAA4, That was a memorable trip ! How awful.

AGAA4 Mon 14-Sept-26 19:29:03

A small Tesco supermarket had opened at the top of our road. I was excited about trying it.
I had put a few things in the basket, felt faint and passed out knocking down a display of cereals.
I was about six weeks pregnant and had never fainted before.
Not the best supermarket visit.

Rocketstop2 Mon 14-Sept-26 19:22:56

I was thinking the other day about the first time I ever went in a Supermarket.As a child, I'd been brought up using only local and corner shops,my Mother used the old co op but eventually it acquired new premises and morphed into a supermarket. I can remember staring at all these goods set out, shelf after shelf of them, no one to ask to serve you these items, having to put it in your basket before you'd handed any money over.It felt astonishing and now we think nothing of it.When I think back now it had VERY limited stock but it was the most ever food I had seen on display .It surely must have led to a certain amount of overbuying as with the local shops you'd probably go with a list, buy exactly what was on it, unless the shopkeeper told you of his special offer or something 'New in' !