The South Shields shop that’s been a Woolworths… and nearly every supermarket name too

Graham Soult

Retail consultant, writer, blogger; helping retailers via CannyInsights.com and CannySites.com. Say hello on Twitter at @soult!

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14 Responses

  1. MARGARET LILY ELSY says:

    Can anyone remember Lindgrens at the Nook – and was it taken over by Dobsons – now a paper shop I think>

  2. Gareth Hill says:

    Here is an article from the Shields Gazette with a photo of the store as Hintons.
    You can see how Hintons kept the frontage as it was including the tiled W logo on the floor and the remains of the logo on the windows.
    https://www.shieldsgazette.com/news/harking-back-hintons-south-shields-381301?amp

  3. Pugh says:

    I remember it as coop as a child separate shops being bakery. General store with overhead track for money to go to cash office and butchers even remember mams coop number Boldon 10963 would be 50s

  4. Mark Cockburn says:

    When I first moved into the area it was called Presto

  5. Susan Murta says:

    Hi my grandparents lived opposite Woolworth Store at 110 Prince Edward Road every Tuesday it was an event to be taken to the store with my grandfather to get my pick n mix quality street sweets I can still remember the pretty coloured wrappers this was 1966 and I was 3 years old at the time, I think the store closed in the early 70’s and became Hintons supermarket

  6. Jim Davis says:

    Was the Woolies in King Street So. Shields extended or modernised at some point as well and reopened by the Corrie actor–Bernard Youens–alias Stan Ogden?

  7. Jim Davis says:

    Was “Moores” store in the same area–It had a sign saying Maypole in tiles on the frontage–There was also Robertsons the Fruiterers and Quigleys the fruiterers as well in the area

  8. Sean Wilson says:

    I worked in this supermarket during my student days when it was Safeway in the late 90s / early 00s. You couldn’t ask for friendlier customers and staff.

    Harton Nook (or simply just “The Nook” as the locals call it) is still a cracking shopping area.

    I didn’t know about the stockroom incident, but come to think of it, there was an eery presence there!

    Very happy memories of this store…long may it continue to thrive…

  9. Ann Employee says:

    I currently work in that store now and we know it used to be a Woolworths store many years ago and their has been sightings and smells (cigar smoke) of an odd presence in our stockroom. We have called the ghost Oscar and its supposedly a former manager, Woolworths one we think, who hung himself in the stockroom many years ago. Does anyone have any more info on this?

  10. Greg says:

    Many former Hintons sites had raised Hintons logos in a row throughout their time as Presto, they just took the Hintons lettering off the sign, painted over the logos with white paint (over the cream) and put Presto letters up over them. At least Linthorpe and Northallerton were the same. When they became Safeways they put a new sign over the top so maybe there are some old Hintons reminders still out there hidden away.

  11. Rob says:

    Really interesting to see this. I remember shopping at Hintons when I was a young lad in the 1980s.

    When it was rebranded to Presto they built quite a large extension on the back, which was the last major refurn until Sainsbury’s gutted it. At the same time, the Liptons store at the bottom of the Nook closed as that chain had also been bought by Presto. This was a non-food store for many years until Tesco recently took it over as a Tesco Metro.

    At one time the Nook had five supermarkets. Hintons, Kwik Save, the Value Stores (now Iceland), Laws (later Wm Low, then closed and subdivided) and Liptons.

    When the Sainsburys refit was taking place they took down the Somerfield fascia and you could see the outline of the old Hintons sign underneath. Presumably it’s still there.

  12. Jonathan Carling says:

    I remember going there often when it was a Hintons, probably in the late 70s

  13. steve gray says:

    Hi Graham
    I used to call on this store when it was a Hintons in 1982/83 as a sales rep for Procter & Gamble
    Steve

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