New World St Martins supermarket well anchored

August 29, 2012

Media Release

New World St Martins supermarket well anchored

The New World supermarket at St Martins has its feet firmly wrapped in reinforced concrete and is anchored to the bedrock up to 20 metres below ground level.

Due to open towards the end of September, the supermarket has 143 piles dug down to bedrock that have been filled with reinforced concrete.

Store owner Russell McKenzie said that the piles are 750mm in diameter and are, on average, 18 metres deep.

“It has been an arduous task with the piling work taking three months to complete, but we wanted to ensure that whatever sized earthquake we might experience in the future, that our customers would feelsafe in our supermarket,” he said.

Other design features of the supermarket include a post tension concrete floor in the main retail area with polished exposed concrete finish and a building management system that will control the lighting, heating, ventilation and security.

“It certainly is a state-of-the-art supermarket and we have been able to incorporate many of the suggestions that we have received from our loyal customers,” he said.

The supermarket is approximately 25% bigger than the last building with 437 grocery bays, more than any other New World in the South Island. It also has 11 full checkouts, two express lanes and seven self-scan areas. There are 253 carparks.

“Our customers will be delighted to know that we will have a new café and espresso counter near the entrance to the supermarket with both indoor and outdoor seating and we have positioned the lotto counter alongside the customer service desk.

“Our bigger size means we can offer customers just so much more. We have a cooking station at the ‘serve over meat’ area where customers can interact with staff and quiz them on different ways of preparing their purchases. Our wine and beer area now has 45 bays compared with 15 in the previous building and we have also extended our fruit and vegetable area, our deli and cheese stand, our fish and seafood area and our butchery and bakery,” he said.

The opening of the supermarket is the first stage of the development, with other retail outlets such as a bank, café and chemist, also likely to open in the coming months.

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