Aldi plans for six new stores in Shropshire
Discount supermarket Aldi has revealed plans for up to six new stores across Shropshire as part of a £600 million expansion.
With shops already under construction in Newport and Oswestry, the company says it could soon be announcing a new store in the south of Telford.
And negotiations are also under way for land deals for two new stores in Shrewsbury and one in Whitchurch. The shops could bring 300 new jobs to the county, Aldi's regional property director said.
George Brown revealed the company's plans for Shropshire when he visited Aldi's new site in Shrewsbury Road, Oswestry – a second store for the north Shropshire town.
"Our current store in Oswestry is now 15 years old and it has been so successful that we needed a second store to spread the load for the number of shoppers we have in the town and its catchment," he said.
Aldi's £600m nationwide expansion includes hiring 8,000 more staff and opening hundreds of new stores. The supermarket is aiming to increase its UK workforce to 35,000, as well as open 130 new stores in the two-year planned investment.
Aldi has boomed in recent years and in April it overtook Waitrose as the UK's sixth-biggest supermarket, with 5.3 per cent of the market share. In Shropshire the new store in Newport off the A41 will open on August 27 with Oswestry in December.
"Shrewsbury, with just one store, is a large target town for Aldi," Mr Brown said.
"We have two sites over which we are having negotiations. We would see Shrewsbury as a three if not four store town."
He said Telford already had three stores north of the M54 and one to the south. "I am hopeful that we will make an announcement shortly about a second store to the south," he said.
In Telford, Aldi has stores in Wellington, Madeley, Snedshill and Donnington, as well as stores in Arlington Way, Shrewsbury, Stourbridge Road, Bridgnorth, and Oswald Road, Oswestry.
