to not want a seventh Tesco opening within two square miles of my home?

[smallorange]

So. I live in a trendy, cappuccino heavy, studenty, bugaboo-tastic area. You know the sort.
We also live cheek-by-jowl with folk who are not so fortunate,as you do in a big, busy city.
We have many independent shops such as opticians, greengrocers, fishmongers, butchers, delis etc.

In the last three years Tesco has aggressively targeted our little area. We now have two massive 24-hour superstores and FIVE Tesco metros opening. They are being built within a few square miles of each other.

They will destroy the little shops who are already facing rising rents and competition from opticians (six in one street) and the bookies (five in one street.)

AIBU to wish Tesco would just get to fuck?

And does anyone have any advice on protesting against them?

I thought perhaps you lived near me, but you don't according to your profile!

It's a nightmare isn't it. To get to anyother supermarket in any direction I have to drive past one of the huge Tesco things, drives me insane. I do not understand how the planners have permitted it. Well I do the different types of store come under different categories so they get around the merger & monopoly restrictions that way

We have just stopped one being built near us. Huge petetion and newspaper campaign etc. It is on hold for now. We live in the one remaining 'village' type places in the city and want it to stay that way. We have 4 supermarkets within 3 or so miles so a little one is just not needed, Hope they stay the hell out

Go to the website Tescopoly.com or co.uk, not sure which...if you google it will come up.

I live in a beautiful small town by the sea,and Tesco have been pushing for years to build a MASSIVE out of town store which will decimate the town centre and all the lovely independent shops. It is f**king depressing. They have a way of getting what they want in the end, but take hope, a couple of towns/urbans areas have managed to resist it..

Tescopoly website has a lot of useful info.

I would be happy to have it, we only get the little tesco metro or tesco local kinda ones here

I also thought you might live near me but in fact it is the other end of the country.

YANBU, it is very depressing when big chains in general, but especially such homogenous ones, obliterate a local community.

I guess we have to hope people vote with their feet and support the smaller shops, but I must admit my morals have often been overcome by the convenience of using said megastores.

Have to say I like the 24 hour stores. But the metro versions just seem designed to squeeze out local shops. There is a little supermarket run by a family whose children go to the same x hool as DD- they will certainly go out of business I'd have thought.

It's the illusion of choice I can't stand. But then large supermarkets provide cheap food - so I suppose there are good things about them.

Will look at Tescopoly - there was a protest at an enormous one just a mile away- but it is still being built.

Our council seems to find it hard to say no to Tesco, but as there were 5000 applications for 300 jobs at the last Metro they opened, it's easy to see why.

It's so depressing.

I have boycotted Tesco since they cynically opened an Express store next door to our fabulous little local shop. The local shop sells everything under the sun, is well-priced, and the guys who run it are lovely. But now people see the familiar old Tesco logo and mindlessly head there instead . And we are only a 15 minute walk from a proper big Tesco.

Grr.

It's so aggressive isn't it. You'd think they were making enough money

Aren't they now britain's biggest employer?

I doubt they are Britain's biggest employer, I thought the NHS were the second or third in the world

I think I heard a couple of years ago that 20% of all money spent in the country goes into their tills. Not sure if that is still true

Ah they are britain'd biggest employer outside the public sector.

Which must mean they carry a fair amount of clout with government, eh.

YANBU.

You should tell Tesco to build a store near me! The nearest one is an hour's drive away.

The nearest Asda is even further.

I must be the only person on the planet who can't just pop to Tesco!

Tesco can only squeezer out local shops and decimate high streets if people go to them rather than the local shops.

The fact that when one opens, people DO choose to go to it over local shops means that people are choosing Tesco voer local shops.

(I suspect many of them are muttering under their breath "Thank goodness, somewhere with low prices and fresh veg that I can park at").

So, the fact that Tesco flourish and small shops close shows that the vast majority of people simply don't care

Yes that's true.

Our greengrocer is better quality and cheaper than Waitrose, though.

We got one last year and people were v concerned BUT their stuff is crap/expensive/don't have it so people still use the Greengrocers/butchers etc. It is useful that they are open later/earlier though. Our town tends to open 9:30ish and close about 4pm

YANBU - I have 2 big Tescos, and 4 small ones within 10 min walk of my flat (central London). Plus a couple of Waitrose, and a couple of Sainsburys, Somerfield & oodles of indie corner shops.

I use to have 4 local independant stores very close to my flat - now just 2 but a Tesco Metro has opened. But I don't have too much sympathy for our lot - ALL 4 indie stores used to sell the same stuff. Despite many requests from me, and presumably other regular local customers, to stock product X or Y they never did. They all sold the same stuff as their competition - it was bizarre.

So at least one of my local shops sells organic milk - and they sell lots of it (so why didn't the indies respond - at least one of them would have done very well selling organic milk)? Pity it's Tescos though. Don't know why the previous shops never did but they shot themselves in the foot.

Also in my borough, we have to pay to park everywhere - for minimum of half an hour - which is 90p - and they know full well everyone will put in £1 and they don't get change. This kills off local shopping - I would pay to park for 10min to pop into local shop as I was driving past, but I resent being stung for £1 to park for 10 minutes - so we keep driving. Our council (the caring conservation success story that is now the model for how the new govt is going to 'rescue' the country), charges these silly parking rates to make ££ & it's very much at the expense of local businesses.

I do continue to support local wine shop over Tescos, and any remaining butchers, veggie market etc still do quite well, but it's an extremely dense population around here.

I agree Tescos are trying to take over - and communities who have their local shops wiped out by these big guys have my sympathy.

TheSecondComing that is exactly right!

Smallorange, I wonder if you live near me? I live in Edinburgh and our fabulous Co-op has been bought out by Tesco. I'm devastated.

I think they deliberately target co-op areas.I 'm in Glasgow. Yhe number of supermarkets around here - not just Tesco - has to be seen to be believed.

can we have your extra tesco? we only have an asda