Metro

This is Lee’s usual grocery store, and we decided to stop in to get some snacks on the way elsewhere. I’m a dirty American, so my comparisons are to US grocery stores, this is the first Canadian grocery store I’ve set foot in!
It’s clean, and seemed to be well organized. It is no Wegmans, but then again, nothing really is, even in the US, other than an actual Wegmans. If I were to place it on my mental «tier» of grocery stores, I’d place it at the mid level — nothing too fancy, but on the other hand not that desperate bulk feeling of a discount grocery. They have a pretty good looking prepared foods area, and I felt it had a good produce selection as well. For a neighborhood supermarket chain, I saw nothing to complain about.

Pretty good selection but pretty awful prices! When 75% of the items are labelled, «New! Lower price!“that tells its own embarrassing story: that Metro overpriced many many items in the first place. But today I got 3 small pork rib chops $ 2.88, Black Diamond process cheese $ 3.99, Villagio Sausage Buns 2/​$ 4, Delissio Frozen Pizza $ 3.99, Olymel Frozen Chicken Wings $ 8.99. So there are some sales if you hunt fiercely enough.

There are two reasons I shop here
1. It is within walking distance
2. It is attached to a mall
If I don’t need anything from the mall, I would never come here. For a supposed «premium» grocery store it is pretty dingy. Their produce selection is «fair» at best and since we’re not so into processed goods, that is pretty important. Their prices are far too high for what you get. Seriously, if you’re not on foot go to food basics or no frills. Same quality, much better prices.

So you can expect the same basic experience here as any other Metro.
What made one of my visits here particularly memorable was that I almost got kicked out of the store for taking photos of some of the displays. Whoops!

I love grocery shopping! There is something soothing about strolling through an empty store at 2am and checking out foods that you would normally be too busy to look at.
Despite being 24 hours location and Airmiles vendor (which quite frankly the only reason they got 2 stars instead of 1) I found this Metro kind of disappointing.
Let’s begin with Metros in general…
From a price point perspective, Metro competes with Longo, Loblaws, and Sobeys and yet it has a dirty discount feel to it!
Am I being a snob? Hell yes!
If I didn’t care about grocery store aesthetics I would shop at No Frills or Choppers… if I am dropping an extra $ 0.50 for my frozen peas I want to be wowed by my surroundings.
First pet peeve is the cart system. Having to riffle through my purse to find a quarter is annoying.
Is Metro really worried about something discount chains do?
They need to do away with this system.
Now lets talk a bit about this Metro…
It has a sad little personal hygiene section (no cosmetics and barely any hair products)
The meat area is impressive in some respects, but very incomplete (no ground pork, no turkey scaloppini, not much steak to choose from)
The produce section is blah
The hot bar lacks variety even on a good day during the day
It’s in a mall but if you shop at night you have to walk all the way to the back of the mall via parking lot to get in
All that being said am I going to shop here again? Probably! I just won’t be skipping through the aisles with girlish glee :-(