Kwik Save is reborn in Spain

Peter O'Toole: discount opportunity in Spain

Peter O’Toole, former store development director at Musgrave, has opened a Kwik Save discount store on the Costa del Sol in Spain.

O’Toole, who worked for Kwik Save as a regional manager in its hey day and as head of format development when it merged with Somerfield, acquired the rights to the Kwik Save Discount Stores brand after the business went into liquidation in 2007.

The new 5,000sq ft store offers a core supermarket range of 3,500 British brands plus fresh foods, which are operated as concessions.

It is located in Torremuelle, an affluent area of the Costa del Sol, home to some 350,000 British ex-pats.

Fantastic deals on British brands

“I initially thought the site would make a great Budgens store because it is in a great residential area, which I call millionaires’ row,” O’Toole told Global Convenience Store Focus.

“But as we started to slip into recession, I thought ‘I know what brand will go well here’, so I registered the Kwik Save trading name in Spain.”

O’Toole, who also heads up a retail consultancy in the UK, said he drew from previous experience for the Kwik Save model, which has a layout based on shopping missions.

“I’ve made retailers really wealthy people from what I’ve done and thought it was time to do it for myself,” he said.

O’Toole has hired local shop fitters to kit out the store and a local, ex-golf caddy master, Sergio Thomson, as store manager.

O’Toole said Thomson had helped source fresh produce from local suppliers.

“We have offered them a concession and we charge rent and don’t have to worry about wastage,” he said.

Fruit and veg concessions from local suppliers

In the same vein, O’Toole has approached a local bar to incorporate a deli offer in store, serving rotisserie chickens, coffee, beers and wines.

In-store deli offer and serve-over counter

Bread is also sourced from a nearby supplier, underscoring the local theme. Taking a leaf out of Musgrave’s book, O”Toole’s name is above the store.

“Its says ‘independent’ and ‘localness’ and people love it,” he says.

The core supermarket range of British brands is currently delivered from a supplier based in Alicante and shipped once a week, although O’Toole has been in talks with other leading wholesale operations.

“Everyone opens the door and goes, “wow, look at those deals”, we have the cheapest Heinz beans in Spain.”

O’Toole claims Kwik Save is already unsettling the competition: Morrisons, a two and a half hour drive away in Gibraltar and Iceland eight miles away in Migas.

“We are starting to get known,” he smiles.

Kwik Save Torremuelle: getting known

O’Toole is considering franchising the Kwik Save brand but has plans for a further two stores himself and possibly a depot to wholesale to other stores.

It’s a tried and tested formula, says O’Toole.

“Kwik Save in its day was a cash and carry for smaller independent retailers. I think it can definitely happen – there’s less competition than launching in Britain. There’s a market here and I am getting in quickly and doing it in a recession. People have to got to eat and if they can get discounted food, it’s got to work,” he says.

Layout based on shopping missions

In the meantime, O’Toole is spreading the Kwik Save message via a radio campaign on Wave FM, a key station on the Costa del Sol.

It adopts a Little Britain theme with impersonators for the cult show’s Andy and Lou, heading off to Kwik Save.

O’Toole reveals store manager Sergio is set to star in the next execution as ‘the only gay in the village’.

“We are using the whole Little Britain theme to says Kwik Save is your Little Britain,” he says.

It has certainly got the expats chatting.

“It’s quite a big talking point in this gloomy environment we are living in at the moment. People either think I’m nuts or a genius. Either way, we’ve got there and it’s a great story.”