Waitrose in Scotland - the serious and the not so serious

I wrote an article here in January this year about the prospects of additional Waitrose stores opening in Scotland, following the news the company wished to have 20 stores here in the next five years (instead of the 3 soon to be 4 they had then - in fact since then I realise that the 4th branch in Newton Mearns opened last year).

In addition, since then I've read some more news:
- the fifth store is to be in Stirling and is expected to open in early 2013 (a report last year mentioned the 5th branch would be in Helensburgh, but as the earlier link in this paragraph is from Waitrose's own press centre and was published in February this year, whereas the second link is from a newspaper article published in January 2011, I think the later link is probably more reliable - perhaps the Helensburgh store had not yet received planning approval? - but see next section);
- a newspaper report published in March 2012 reports the 7th store will be in Milngavie (Glasgow area), but it also mentions that the planning approvals for both the Stirling and Helensburgh stores (5th and 6th) were approved a month earlier and that both will open early in 2013, whilst it is hoped that the Milngavie store will open before 2014.

So that's the first seven more or less sorted out, with places such as Ayrshire and Perthshire being mentioned as on their 'hit list' amongst others. Hopefully, Highland Region will not miss out completely!

Now for a little light relief, I just came across this Daily Mash article dating from November 2011, which throws its own characteristically acerbic/humorous eyes over the issue of Waitrose in Scotland - quite funny really!

Could north Scotland get a Waitrose in coming 5 years?

A couple of evenings ago I was discussing with some friends here our current supermarket shopping options, both very locally here in Nairn and within reasonable distance (by car or bus) in Inverness, Forres or slightly father afield in Elgin. Very locally, we now have a recently-opened and very welcome Sainsbury, with the main alternative being the decidedly inferior (in various ways) Co-operative. In Inverness there are several Tesco outlets, as well as a Morrison, plus various others such as a Co-operative, Lidl and Aldi. Forres duplicates up with a Tesco and a Lidl and Elgin has various including the only Asda in the area, until the planned store in Inverness opens later this year.

We all agreed that it would be great if a Waitrose were to come to this area, but thought that this was unlikely - but one can live in hope. Currently there are 3 branches in Scotland (2 in Edinburgh, 1 in Glasgow), with a 2nd store planned for Glasgow soon. However, Waitrose has signalled it would like to open a further 16 stores in Scotland over the coming 5 years. Now, I expect most of those will be in the Edinburgh or Glasgow area, with perhaps Aberdeen and Dundee getting a look-in, but maybe, just maybe, their consumer profiling exercises could justify one further north, possibly in Inverness, or even (I said I was being fanciful!) in little old Nairn?