Hillside vs. New Zealand —See Page B7—

tee aeniaenee ENTERTAINMENT Sports Desk 985-2131 BUSINESS * WGO > TV

WHILE THE focus of the pre-Christmas com- petition for consumer dollars was on the general retail side of things, the coming battle for Sunday spending appears likely to be on the grocery front.

A raft of changes over the past half-dozen years — ranging from the in- troduction of large-scale bulk food stores to wag- it-yourself operziions — has made tle grocery business fiercely com- petitive,

One of Sunday cpen- ¢ ing’s firm supporters is Gary Cassels, manager of IGA store number 11, located on Marine Drive in North Vancouver, a : a ; store that’s been opening RPG (ARSE BA Sunday for more than a

: 4 year now.

“Before coming to work here, | was manager of a Tsawwassen store,” Cassels said. ‘‘We were open Sunday and then we all decided toa shut down. What we found is that we were losing business?”

That lesson was con- firmed by the North Vancouver experience where Sunday opening — particularly when the store was the only major Sunday grocery source when it first started open- ing — led to an increase in business.

‘Since everybody’s started opening, business hasn't been as good as it was, but we've still been able to hold on to a solid core of IGA shoppers,"’ [f

at ef Cassels said.

SARUARY

Cassels sees another benefit to Sunday shopp- ing, particularly for a chain such as IGA when up against the targer chains.

“T's true’ he said. “We're not cne of the bigger stores. We try to compete be offering more personatized service; Sunday shopping is one of the ways we have of achieving that.”’

While Lower Mainland shops stay open, they‘re closed in Victoria. |

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