It's a multi-million mega-super Pak 'n Save.
Yesterday Wanganui entered the mega-era, when Pak 'n Save opened its doors after two and a-half years of planning and construction.
Ngaire Watt cut the ribbon to the new supermarket at 10am, an honour bestowed for her 20 years service, many of those as manageress
in the former Self Help store on Victoria Ave, before retiring in 1985.
Keen shoppers crowded into the store, and the 360 parking spaces beneath the supermarket and around the perimeter of the petrol station filled fast, as workmen put finishing touches to the parking space markings and the ramp leading to the shop entrance.
Pak 'n Save operator Nigel Jones said the mega-store was a natural evolution in supermarket shopping, and his investment on top of the $15 million building (owned by the Foodstuffs group) was for a "long, long time".
"It is a pleasure to serve the Wanganui community, and we can now get down to business after all the planning."
The Jones family came to Wanganui in 1977, where they operated the Cut Price store, which had a name change from Self Help.
Self Help, a well-known brand in those days, was one of the first stores where shoppers picked their own goods from the shelves. Mr Jones said he then opened Write Price on the Victoria Ave/Liverpool St corner in 1982, where customers wrote the prices with felt-tip pens on their products, but computer-generated bar-coding superseded the practice in 1990.
Write Price closed on Sunday night and is expected to reopen in three months' time as the rebranded New World.
l New World operated in Gonville, but closed in March, and reopened as SuperValue, part of the Progressive group, in May.
