Your Budgens: Kalyan Akisetty
In the driving seat Independent retailer Kalyan Akisetty has transformed a former car showroom into a servicefocused convenience store.
There’s a new noise echoing up the streets of Alva: The revving of engines has been replaced with the ringing of tills and swishing off shopping bags thanks to an ambitious refit by independent retailer Kalyan Akisetty, who has transformed the town’s old car-showroom into a thrumming Budgens convenience store. “I first came across the site in early 2020 and as soon as I saw it I just knew it was ripe for conversion into a convenience store. “The opportunities that it presented were huge. For one thing, being a car-showroom meant that it had a large carpark which is a luxury that most of the other stores in this area and our nearest competitor, don’t have. “Secondly, at the time that I came across the site, the town’s only Post Office had closed down meaning that local shoppers were in sore need of a store that could offer them this crucial service. “Thirdly, while the area has a high elderly shopper demographic, it was about to get a fresh rush of young families thanks to a new housing development which at the time of purchase, was in the early stages of being built but is now close to completion.
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Volume 12: February 2022
