The irony when Dominos are the last high street chain standing

In the longer-term the demise of these chains may be a good thing. It paves the way for lower retail rents and the possibility of diverse high streets with exactly the sort of shops Mintball hankers after. Just a thought.

Bored when out of town last week, I went to see the Jack Reacher flick. Next day I mentioned to a site manager that I had seen it and he said he had also seen it as well as the Zero Dark Thirty film as well. I said I thought the latter wasn't out until late January and he said he had downloaded both for nothing. There is no wonder that Blockbuster cannot survive, I doubt any of there films isn't available at some illegal site on the net.

this.
and it's a problem for the government at the minute because they desperately need people to dig out the plastic and go mental, they need self certification mortgages to kick start, they need people to plead with the bank that they can afford the mortgage that's 6 times their salary and they need them to change their 4 year old car for a 2 year old car. unfortunately for them people realised they don't actually need lots of stuff and recalibrated their spending habits, i certainly did and i don't think i'm missing out. i must have wandered into hmv half a dozen times over the xmas period and each time i saw something i ended up walking away as i didn't actually need it whereas in the past i'd have bought the lot.

Seconded.

I wonder how long it will be before people realise it is no longer 'essential' to have the latest Ipad / smartphone.

Well it's obvious that Tesco et al have got you well & truly hooked.

I'm currently operating a franchise, supplying frozen fish meat & poultry and speciality dishes, direct to the door. I have little problem selling ribeye steak at £33 per kilo because when anyone who knows what real steak should look like, they immediately appreciate the difference. Our ribeye, sirloin and fillet comes from a grass-fed, Somerset herd and is hung for 28 days before butchering. Sainsbury's once embarked on a great advertising campaign, shouting that their beef was 21 day matured. It wasn't a great success because they'd already convinced their customers that beef should be red in colour and not chestnut bordering on mahogany. Even my local butcher (a man who knows the name of the beast the cut came from), no longer puts his best cuts in the window, simply because many of his customers have been similarly "conditioned". Many beef joints sold in supermarkets are topside or silverside, both joints that should only really be pot-roasted because they don't have the natural fat to keep them moist. Look at the cooking instructions and they'll tell you nothing about slow or pot-roasting.

Similarly, I sell salmon fillet at £25 per kilo and have never received a single complaint, in fact it's my single best selling product. The difference between my North Atlantic, wild-caught salmon is streets away from the farmed salmon on sale in any supermarket. Next time you visit a supermarket's fishmonger slab, take a close look at the salmon. They keep the skin on to avoid you seeing the layer of fat between the skin and flesh, similarly those white lines that branch from the centre are also fat. Wild salmon is all muscle. I gave a woman a salmon fillet this afternoon, free, gratis and for nothing. She told me she only bought salmon tail fillet because it was less "oily" than the loins. I am convinced I'll have no problem selling her a 2 kilo box next time I visit.

I boast that "If I wouldn't eat it, you won't find it on my van". I wouldn't carry any cod during December because I wasn't happy with the quality. I refuse to ever carry pangasius at all. If you're wondering what pangasius is, you may find it listed as "cobbler" or "Basa". In reality, pangasius is Vietnamese river catfish ad a dirtier fish would be difficult to find on sale, yet the supermarkets are quite happy to stock it. Please don't tell me, that was through customer demand.

I rarely buy any fish or meat from a supermarket because the "fishmongers" and "butchers" employed by them are anything but. Try asking a supermarket butcher for a bone-in shoulder of pork, you won't get it, simply because "head office don't supply it". Now try and find a proper butcher who can supply a joint from a traditional breed like Gloucester Old Spot and follow rland I gurantee you really will "taste the difference".rl

A long time, as people, by-and-large, are idiots.

It is all very well and good championing this sort of thing however you have to take into the account cost. Not everybody can afford to pay £25 per kilo for salmon. I work on the counters at a supermarket (I would never dream of calling myself a fishmonger, my "training" was to spend an afternoon with my colleague so that I could cover on there when needed), but we get people complaining about the price of cod loin which is £19 a kilo, they would have a heart attack if you tried to charge them £25. Yes it might taste better, you might get better knowledge from the staff at a proper fishmongers (I won't say service because supermarket staff can deliever top service within their remit, it isn't our fault we aren't given the training) but what's the point in that if you cannot afford the product?

Do cod have loins ?

I am sure the quality differences are evident to all, the problem is - and the point I am trying to make - is the difference is sufficiently important enough for most to make the effort to seek it out.

If I want something good I will go to Lishman's but the enhanced experience of the food isn't worth an hour round trip every week to get it. For the vast majority of people even a 5 minute trip can't be justified. The chicken I get from the supermarket is more than adequate to fill me fijitas would a superior chicken costing double the price really make that much of a difference to my curry?

I think you've put your finger on it there.
The public in general is happy to watch food porn on telly but the majority don't cook and don't actually care what rubbish they eat, providing it's cheap and easy.
I sometimes wonder why people pay vast sums for palatial kitchens when they only need a two-burner and a microwave to heat-up the sort of stuff with which the supermarket aisles are filled.

The Queens Hotel on City Square in Leeds now in administration (once the most prestigious hotel in the city)...

Otley is an interesting example of a small market town which has a twice weekly (???) thriving fresh produce market, supports a once a month farmers market and other than the three supermarkets you mention plus Superdrug, has no other major retail representation on its main street - sure it has plenty of charity shops (which are pretty good quality actually) but it also has its fair share of butchers and especially individual, independant bakers.

Free parking all day every day is its master stroke of genius and it attracts enough shoppers to keep itself busy both at the lower end and the top notch (award winning pork butchers) end of the market.

That is definitely a case of a business not keeping up with the competition, Malmaison and The Raddison are both far superior hotels and cost the same to stay in, Queens had it's hey day but it hasn't been in the top 10 in Leeds for quite some time, I can't imagine it will actually close, one of the chains may see an opportunity to buy it on the cheap. It's biggest problem is what used to be it's biggest asset, location, it's probably one of the noisiest "premier" Hotels I've ever stayed in, being able to hear station announcements at 6am on a Sunday and the buses rumbling past until early hours isn't what people want now.