“Partridges’ top 5”

Expert Eye with

John Shepherd

Owner and Managing Director of Partridges

• Is our café a hero or a villain?
• “The battle for optimism and morale in retail”
• “Sustainable confusion”
• “What to do about January?”
• “Is the Christmas boom sustainable?”

Last month I wrote about the effect of the weather on sales, and so far it seems like this summer is maintaining the recent mini trend of relatively benign weather

So good news, hopefully, for speciality food shops around the country. But how does this translate in terms of sales in the shop? To be honest, I do not spend as much time as I should looking at the individual sales data produced by the tills. Apart from the overall sales figures on a daily, weekly or quarterly basis, the individual sales from each department are often overlooked.

So what do we actually sell at Partridges by department and does this compare to delis elsewhere?

1) Grocery – 25%
This sounds quite boring – or should I say unsurprising – but for us, grocery includes all the staples such as eggs, teas, coffees, soft drinks, biscuits, olive oils, jams and honeys etc, which no local deli can do without. Soft drinks in all their shapes and sizes are an increasing part of this, especially, of course, in summer. It is good to see so many innovative new drinks coming through like cold pressed coffee and fruit juices, health drinks and flavoured drinks. We have not had much luck with non-alcoholic cocktails, which at one time we thought would become quite big as in other countries. Like many delis we have an abundance of olive oil and chilli-based products. This section also includes our gift hampers.

2) The Deli Counter – 12%
The heart of the shop in so many ways. Cheese, charcuterie and smoked salmon are still the big hitters. Pies, quiches and salads too, of course, and dare I say that caviar plays a small but important part of a Chelsea deli. We still get asked for foie gras but stopped selling it a few years ago. A new discovery for us has been empanadas, which are like mini Cornish Pasties and sell very well in a variety of flavours. Our empanada producer can barely keep up with demand!

3) The Wine Department – 11%
This is an area that really differentiates us from the multiple retailers. Brands are not so prevalent, and our wine buyer, Francois Ginther, is rightly proud of so many of the great discoveries he has made with smaller producers. Alcoholic beverages play a key role both in the summer and at Christmas, and are a vital part of the shop. The wine department does well partly due to our late closing time (10pm).

4) Dairy Products – 9%
Milk is why this area performs so well, aided and abetted by butters, margarines and yoghurts. I always feel it is reassuring when a shop has reasonable milk sales. It seems to be serving a purpose in the local community by selling such a basic product alongside all the other more speciality lines.

5) The Coffee Shop – 8.5%
This department keeps growing year on year – in fact, faster than any other department in the shop. So much so that it’s difficult for us to keep up with it. It started out from a low base, as something of a sideline, and despite the fact that it presents a number of management problems on a regular basis such as integration with the rest of the shop, staff training and recruitment and kitchen logistics, it is gaining significant importance with respect to profitability.