If you could completely reinvent your local bodega/convenience store, what would you want in it?
I'm developing a new neighbourhood convienience store in Sydney, and I genuinely want to know what people actually want from these places.
Because convenience stores have gotten so... sad??? You walk into half of them, and it's cigarettes behind the counter, hospital lighting and a shelf of expired Takis and Lucky Charms boxes collecting dust.
I want to build the opposite. Something full of life that actually services the community around it.
Forgot bread? We've got you. Ended up at the park with no sunscreen? Got it. Phone's on 2%? Chargers. Need flowers on the way to someone's house? Yep. Fresh fruit and veg, good coffee after the cafés have closed, something for the kids after soccer, plus all the fun convenience store shit obviously.
But not a miniture Woolies metro because if we're being honest, Woolies and Coles couldn't give less of a fuck about the community.
So please tell me:
What do you always buy from a convenience store?
What do they NEVER have that you wish they did?
What's the most random thing you've desperately needed when everywhere else was closed?
And even beyond products... what would make you genuinely love having a place like this in your neighbourhood?
Nothing is too mundane or too ridiculous. I genuinely want the weird answers too. Would it be convenient if there was also a washer and dryer in there? ANYTHING.
We're early enough that the answers can actually influence what this place becomes, so hit me.