[imagesource: James de Villiers / Business Insider South Africa]

In much the same way that many Capetonians have a ranking system for the ‘Big Four’ boys’ schools (you can argue over the first three amongst yourselves, but SACS is fourth), there’s also often a prestige rank for where you choose to shop.

Again, you can bicker about the order of Checkers, Spar, and Pick n Pay, but Woolworths is clearly coming out tops, and you only need to look at their prices to see that they know it.

Where am I going with this? Well, in Sandton City (basically the Constantia Village of Jozi), that pecking order looks set for some serious upheaval, with the Shoprite group opened its new flagship Checkers Hyper in Sandton City last night.

Back in July, we outlined how Checkers was getting ready to pilfer some clientele from Woolies with the new “FreshX” stores, and now the battle is well and truly on.

Business Insider SA’s James de Villiers was at the launch, and he took some pictures of the swanky setup, which Shoprite CEO Pieter Engelbrecht said is “the best supermarket in Africa”.

Let’s dive in:

The store features a sushi station with a conveyer belt.

Shoprite said it tried to create a market atmosphere in the takeaways section, with several nooks and crannies for people to explore.

Damn, that is a pretty nice touch.

The in-store coffee station will also sell fresh pancakes, muffins and sarmies. For those who prefer a chardonnay over lunch (the Sandton activewear crowd), you’re in luck:

The wine section is designed to mimic a wine-cellar and is temperature controlled to ensure optimal conditions.

The in-store Kuaui is the first in Africa, and the Checkers Sandton store will even have a test kitchen, which will host food demonstrations.

The store is packed with tech products, the latest toys, and more Smeg products than is probably necessary.

There’s also an in-store pharmacy, and an entire aisle devoted to the sale of suitcases.

To see the rest of the Business Insider SA photos, head here.

In short, the Checkers FreshX concept store is coming in hot and opens to the general public today.

So, will it put a dent in the bottom line of the Woolworths in Sandton City? I guess that depends on how willing people are to say they shopped at Checkers (but it was a FreshX concept store, darling), and the pricing.

Let the battle begin.

[source:businessinsider]