Monday, March 19, 2007

Hyper About Giant

Giant Hypermart At Tampines Avenue 10
After some shake-ups, life goes on here in Singapore... particularly in Tampines with the latest attraction for the people living in the eastern part of the island.

Giant Supermarket opened its huge flagship hypermart last Thursday, 15 March 2007.

Just like IKEA and Courts which had already opened their own flagship stores about 3 months ago. Giant is the third to open at the same location along Tampines Avenue 10.

I stopped by to check out the hypermart on my way back from work on Friday.

Unlike IKEA and Courts where everyone had to queue in a long, almost endless line outside the store before getting in, Giant has a large entrance that needed no queuing at all.

Instead the 30 odd checkout counters were clearly not enough to speed-up people from going out that day, as it took almost half an hour to get served and paid my purchases. Phew!

It reminded me of Carrefour at Suntec City. Large, warehouse like supermarket, with stacks and stacks of the merchandise in neat rows and isles within a very large area.


This puny island is transforming its little neighourhood provision shops to supermarkets... and now hypermarts are popping up everywhere across the island as the population swells.

Hyper is the new Super now! Awesome.

Just before Giant, NTUC Fairprice opened its flagship Megamarket in AMK Hub in December 2006. The Hub is serving the neighbourhood, factories and office workers in the central part of the island.

Though not fully opened yet, the 2 floors in the basements are operationing in full swing. NTUC Fairprice known previously only for groceries now sells everything from clothes to electronics goods.

Coming back to Giant in Tampines, I went again with my son on Saturday, 17 March 2007 around 7:00pm. It was a bad idea to have dinner at there. The cafeteria was too small to cater to the large opening crowd.

We had our dinner at Courts instead... that was still after a 40-minute queue to buy our food! Yikes!

Giant Hypermart Night Lights
Giant has lots of items that are truly cheap. I especially like the DVD section. Good and latest movie titles at a bargain price of S$8.00... a dollar higher than pirated copies, but worth to protect intellectual property rights and not breaking any law.

Just like IKEA and Courts, the crowd will die down given a couple of months. That is if there is no sale going though.

I just cannot believe that the once flat grassland along Tampines Avenue 10 is now bustling with traffic and throngs of shoppers especially on the weekends. The 3 giant retailers have made this once deserted piece of land into a bright and alive shopping haven

Glad I chose Tampines to set up home and family. Yes!

3 comments:

  1. I have been checking up today quite a lot happening sorry to be lagging in my comments

    ReplyDelete
  2. Imran - I haven't heard of hypermarts before. I heard it here first. I hope your beautiful homeland doesn't become a large strip mall.

    ReplyDelete
  3. That is a very huge shopping center. I would truly get lost in it and be afraid of not making it out before the store closed and being locked in all night. Maybe that would be kinda cool. I guess I would have a place to sleep and all. What a crazy imagination I do have. I hope you don't get lost in the giant store. If you do, make sure you know where the bedding department is and most important, the washrooms. Hee hee.

    ReplyDelete

Hello Everyone,

Thank you for stopping by and leaving me your messages. I will also try to answer any questions you may have for me.

Thanks again and have a good day.

Regards,
Muhd Imran
PAL Blogger