Holland & Barrett

It’s incredible to any rational person that a shop like Holland & Barrett can still exist in the 21^st century. You’d think that retailers selling witches’ potions would have died out centuries ago in the educated Western world but no, here it still is with its quack cures for imaginary illnesses and its sugary and fat-​laden mock health foods. The vast majority of the lines have no scientific proof of their value while others may be actively hazardous, hence the need for recent European legislation to safeguard the unwary cranks that patronise such businesses. H&B always have some kind of bogus offer on e.g. buy one get one for 1p, thinly veiling the fact that they have so few customers that they need to make a killing by inflating the unit price on everything they do sell. Omega 3 fish oil is about the only item I’d ever consider buying in here, although even with that the purity can be called into question. It also seems to be one of the most overstaffed little shops I’ve been in I was tripping over them at every turn on my visit this morning. The lousy Mr Holland and Mr Barrett tv ads they put out a couple of years back scraped the marketing barrel, and the illiterate sign saying Thankyou [sic] for your custom as you leave reinforces the general air of uselessness about the whole thing. Centuries ago we knew how to deal with people who ran this kind of business, and I for one would be looking for a nice viewing spot upwind of the stake that Mr H and Mr B would be burned at.

This Holland & Barrett branch quite takes my fancy. It isn’t too shiny and much more welcoming than the other branches in Bristol. It almost looks quite shabby from the outside, which makes me really like it. There are only about 3 staff on rotation here, all of whom are so very nice and always helpful.
They sell the normal health food shop items, dried fruit, an assortment of cakes and biscuits, oats, nuts, and they have a shelf fridge which I always like to poke my nose around, as they stock really great stuff! The non dairy cheeses are something very tasty indeed, and they have packets of organic bean sprouts they bring in here every Tuesday (delicious) which I can’t find anywhere else in Bristol. There is also a lunch selection of gluten free pastries and small cartons of soya and rice milks to take away.
They also allow booking of their fresh foods, where they will set aside what you want when their delivery comes in and you can collect it from them later on. For a chain, this shop operates like a quaint little village store, which is a very nice thing to find in the busy city center.

There are quite a few Holland and Barratts in Bristol and at least two in the city centre alone but this is always the one that I go to. It is placed just a stone’s throw away from my gym, Fitness 4 Less, which makes it a perfect pit stop on the way home for a relatively healthy snack (or some chocolate coated brazils if my cravings get the better of me). It’s rarely massively busy in this branch which is good. It means that not only do you not have to queue but that the sales assistant usually has the time to offer you meaningful advice about the products, which is a real help when you are looking at shelves and shelves of oddly named vitamins with very little info on the labels. It’s also well worth checking out the baskets and shelves near the till where they often put heavily reduced stock.

I don’t know whether you have seen the Holland and Barrett advert with Martin Corry on TV, have you? if you have please dont judge the shop on the advert’s shortfalls.
HB sells all sort of health foods and vitamins, if you need vitamin~ then they will have it, and at a reasonable price. If you need to get dried fruit, they have that too. If you need garlic pills to avoid getting bitten by mosquitos… you guessed it they have that too!
The staff are kind, and helpful, and if there is anything they don’t have that you need they will get it in from one of their bigger stores!