Premier Convenience Store, also known as the Clifton Food Market, situated on the troubled Clifton…read moreStreet, is one of several convenience stores that are vying for diminishing trade since the one way system was implemented about a year ago. One of the ways that this store attempts to compete is by keeping its doors open as much as possible, and so it is open seven days a week from 8.00 in the morning to ten 'o' clock at night. It is also one of the few places that still stocks newspapers, and of course the discounted alcohol that it carries remains ever popular! Another thing that is impacting the smaller corner shops on the street is the fact that the council have granted permission for a Tesco Metro midway up the street. Although Premier Convenience Store is part of a chain, it is run as a family business, allowing the owner to make a reasonable profit for the responsibilities of running a complex shop of this kind. Conversely, Tescos employ people on minimum wage to work all hours, and then keep the profits for themselves. This means that huge sums of money leave the local economy, and end up in the pockets of the fat cats in London. This is really bad news for Clifton Street and Cardiff as well as Wales as a whole. What Cardiff and Clifton Street need more than anything else is for the council to stop making choices that will further entrench the recession, making it ever more difficult to turn these desperate times around. Cardiff needs a good flow of money within the local economy to endure the vicissitudes of the global slump. If this does not happen, the people of Cardiff can look forward to the prospect of working unsocial hours for an almost punitive wage, with all of the profits being siphoned out of the economy and shipped off to England! If this happens the people of Cardiff will not have the spending power to improve their lot over time!

This is a small Co-Op but they have a good range of products, including a small selection of…read moregreetings cards and a large selection of magazines. However it is best avoided on a Friday or Saturday night as the place is crawling with students and drunks and there isn't a very nice atmopsphere. The staff are always friendly and chatty and they would often put stuff by for me if I asked. There is also a cash machine in this Co-Op but it is one of those ones that charge you for withdrawing so you're probably better off to pay card if you can.

This Londis is basically the village shop stocking your basic amenities that you may need if you…read morelive here or are visiting the area. It is quite a big store and stocks a large raneg of the basic items that people want and need. This store is located in the centre of Woolacombe, with a selection of other shops. There is parking outside but this can be very limted in the summer months when the village is busy. The store is a 5 minute walk from the beach so it is good for those days when you are lounging on the beach you can get stuff onthe way to or from the beach.

To people not from these parts some place names are legendary about Bristol: The Tobacco Factory…read moreand the Docks for example. Once you live here there are others: The Bear Pit, Cribbs etc. Another place you don't really know about until you live here is The Best. The (self titled) Best Supermarket is legendary. The shop is open 24/7 every day of the year. Even in the harshest of blizzards I have never seen the door closed. They sell crisps, chocolate bars and various other things you would expect of such a convenience store. It is after hours however when they really become something else. This is the only shop that will sell all types of alcohol at all hours. The staff are hardened as you'd expect; their clientele the late drinkers: poets after another bottle of inspiration, students after more beers and all the rest of it. The Best Supermarket is, well, what it is.

Yes it has all your desied goods!…read more Yes it is 24 hours! And yes you can satisfy pretty much any food or drink craving at any time of the day by getting something from here. But 'the best supermarket'?, i'll give them a little le-way for artistic license but I think they should perhaps pre-fix the name with 'Arguabley' then it will give them some margin for error! But seriousley, this place is pretty good, great to have a place of convieniance and open all hours, reliable and plentiful, not bad...

A funny little convenience store, very dark inside. Unlike many convenience stores which add and…read moreextra 3 pounds on the bottle for the convenience, the wine here is pretty good value. It sells some sandwiches and convenience food at the back of the store, has some basics and a freezer with things like pizza's and an ice-cream freezer. Unlike many small convenience stores, the ice-cream doesn't look like it has melted and frozen about 3 times before you've bought it. It also sells milka chocolate - hurrah! The staff here are very friendly, although I'm afraid I can never understand what the young guy is saying to me.

Very close to several large student housing blocks this is a shop with one clientele in mind. For…read moreone thing these dedicated guys are open every day from 7am till midnight. A quick walk around the shop reveals all the student essentials you can imagine. They have tights, fruit juice, a wide range of male and female toiletries, a stationary section and the largest selection of biscuits I have ever seen. This is not an exaggeration; think Hobnobs, Digestives, Crunch biscuits, ones I'd forgotten about, one's I've never even heard about! A whole wall of biscuits - extraordinary. As all students necessitate the stuff there's obviously a wide choice of beers and wine with regular deals and discounts. Ready meals, soups, pre made sandwiches and for those on a budget the morning after, miniature boxes of cereal. A well thought out shop keeping Bristol's students satiated.

If temp bar and waiter work is your thing (or catering / hospitality in general), then West One…read moreRecruitment should be on your hit list. The staff are really personable - you can register immediately and they give you a crash course / refresher in how to lay a table and carry multiple plates. They aren't one of those agents that never get in touch - quite literally you could have work the next day. They often have to send a few staff at a time to certain venues - so if any of the other temps has a car, they organise drop-off and pick-up from the office, which is a great help.

This is a good little Spar store. It sells food and coffee to go (lattes are £1.50), as well as…read morehaving a bakery. It's also an off-license and sells lottery tickets. Perhaps best of all it has a free ATM. As with so many of the Spar shops it has free off-road parking. What more could you want? I love Spar stores for a whole host of reasons, the main one being that Spar is a franchise like Londis and the Life Style convenience stores, and so they are owned as independent businesses, and are not to be confused with supermarket chains. The essential and important difference is that supermarkets make their profits for the organisation, whereas shops like Spar are profitable for the individual owners. A friend told me an interesting statistic the other day... apparently 80% of the money spent at supermarkets leaves the local economy whereas 80% of the money spent at independent stores remains within circulation locally, which is great if it's true! If high percentages of money leave a localised area, then impoverishment will eventually ensue. So, to retain 80% of the money you spend within the area in which you live means the opposite! I can often buy things cheaper here than I can at bigger supermarkets. I find it interesting that we have all bought into the fallacy that supermarkets sell things cheaper. It's just not true in many instances! There's no denying that the massive supermarket chains indulged in a price war to kill off their smaller competitors, but when they felt that they had done as much damage as possible, they allowed their prices to steadily rise, allowing them to make more profit per customer. Perhaps what they didn't reckon with is that shops like Spar and Londis were going to preserve a lot more independently owned convenience stores than they thought. Not only is this competition essential to keep the larger stores in line, but it also means that local convenience stores have access to larger bulk buying discounts, thus often making them more able to undercut the big boys! Because Spar shops are all franchises, they can, if they want, participate in national promotions, and offer discounted items for a limited period. Not every Spar shop is the same. Being independently owned means that the proprietor of each shop can buy in stock that is culturally relevant to the local area in which they trade. This has to be seen as a distinct advantage Spar has over its larger rivals, but the main benefit to the local communities which they serve is that when locals shop at Spar they are making an investment in the future!