Aldi, the UK's leading food discounter, have opened a new store on Eastrea Road, Whittlesey.

The 1.93 acre site accommodates an Aldi store of circa 19,250 sq ft along with parking spaces for 127 cars, including six accessible bays, seven parent-and-child spaces, and four electric vehicle (EV) charging points.

The store is immediately adjacent to the new 'Whittlesey Lakeside' housing development developed by Barratt's.

Aldi opened its first store in the UK in 1990 and now has more than 990 stores and around 40,000 colleagues. In 2022, Aldi increased its market share further and officially became Britain's fourth largest supermarket, ahead of Morrisons, Lidl and Co-op.

The vendor, a private property company, were advised by MP Real Estate.

Aldi were advised by Lamb & Swift.

CoStar Group, Inc., the leading provider of commercial real estate information, analytics and online marketplaces, today announced the CoStar Awards Quarterly Deals winners for the first quarter of 2023.

Neil Perrin at MP Real Estate came out on top in the list of winners in Top Retail Leasing deals for the East of England.

CoStar Awards Quarterly Deals winners are determined by their top deals completed every quarter, based on price and square footage.

Neil advised Aldi on the subletting of a 6,760 sq ft retail unit to British Heart Foundation.

For more information, visit: Quarterly Deals Winners | CoStar Awards

Subway have opened a new store on the Regiment Business Park, located to the north of Chelmsford City Centre adjacent to the A130.

Developed by Chelmsford based developer Aquila Holdings Ltd, the first phase comprises a McDonalds and Costa drive thrus alongside a Shell petrol filling station fronting onto Essex Regiment Way (A130). The second phase, which has recently completed, provides a new Morrison’s Supermarket, a Greggs drive thru and Subway. The last phase is under development to provide circa 93,000 sq ft of B1, B2 and B8 units.

Subway were advised by MP Real Estate.

Aquila were advised by Coke Gearing.

Whitbread, the UK's largest hotel business, is bringing its popular Premier Inn hotel brand to the heart of Cambridge City Centre at the Lion Yard Shopping Centre.

It has agreed a lease with investment and asset manager abrdn to convert vacant office space above the popular shopping centre into a 125-bedroom Premier Inn hotel

When it opens the hotel will be Premier Inn's first hotel in the centre of Cambridge and its fourth location across the historic city.

Paul Smith, Acquisitions Manager for Whitbread, said:

"We have an excellent track record of converting former office spaces into vibrant and successful Premier Inn and hub by Premier Inn hotels. We were able to take this experience to abrdn and work with them to develop plans to convert a redundant office above the popular Lions Yard shopping centre into a latest format Premier Inn hotel.

"This acquisition will allow our business and leisure customers to stay in a unique location in the very heart of historic Cambridge. Our partner abrdn also benefits from a secure, indexed-linked income stream from Whitbread and our expertise at converting existing spaces into thriving hotels. We are looking for other similar opportunities across the country as we grow our network towards our target of 125,000 Premier Inn and hub bedrooms."

Construction work to convert the hotel is due to commence in March (2023) with Premier Inn expecting to welcome its first guests to the new hotel in mid-2024. As it does so, the hotel will grow Premier Inn's network in Cambridge to more than 425 affordable bedrooms.

The Cambridge Lion Yard Premier Inn will feature the brands latest format 'standard' and enhanced Premier Plus bedrooms as well as its integrated ground floor F&B space. Approximately 30 new jobs are expected to be created on opening with recruitment focused locally.

Whitbread currently operates 82,000 Premier Inn and hub by Premier Inn bedrooms in the UK and Ireland and has a long-term target to achieve 125,000 UK and Ireland rooms.

The company was advised by Cambridge-based property consultants MP Real Estate on the Lion Yard acquisition and it continues to search for new locations in Cambridge and across the eastern region for its popular hotel brands.

Aldi have reopened their refurbished and extended their store at London Road in Grays, Essex.

The store, which Aldi own, closed for a few months whilst works took place to extend the Aldi store into the area previously occupied by Poundstretcher who moved out when their lease expired last year. The surplus area was sublet to Screwfix Direct Ltd who took a 10 year lease on a unit of 5,188 sq ft.

MP Real Estate acted for Aldi.
Hartnell Taylor Cook acted for Screwfix.