Celtic Treasure Chest: Steve and Lil McVittie Open New Delta Location
 CELTIC TREASURE CHEST owners Steve and Lil McVittie at their new shop in Delta. |
By CATHOLINE BUTLER
VANCOUVER – Some people use GPS to reach their destination, but my favourite navigator is Colleen. Often times we take the scenic route and enjoy the view along the way in this beautiful part of the world.
This is what we did recently on our way to Delta to visit the new Celtic Treasure Chest located at 7550 River Road in Delta. This is the third Celtic Treasure Chest for owners Lil and Steve McVittie. The other locations are on Dunbar Street in Vancouver and Foster Street in White Rock.
The Delta Celtic Treasure Chest shop is situated in a plaza with the familiar sign easily recognized from the road. It carries the same unique UK products as the other two locations.
In Delta, the Celtic Treasure Chest shop occupies the front of the premises, while the wholesale division – The British Isles in Canada Wholesale Ltd. – is located in the 1,400 square feet warehouse directly behind the shop.
The warehouse has ample shelving for storage to accomodate all the stock arriving on pallets from overseas. This huge warehouse space services the other two locations and the wholesale end of the business.
It is obvious that Lil and Steve have put a huge effort into organizing this new location. There is new hardwood flooring and freshly painted walls and shelving.
The merchandising has been very well done. There is a lot of product in the shop, yet it’s all attractively displayed with wide, uncluttered aisles, for the customer to browse.
I spoke to Steve about the challenges and work involved in setting up this new shop and warehouse.
He said, “We had a lot of unexpected challenges – primarily with tradespeople. The signs for the store took four weeks longer than planned, the countertop was a week late, the new flooring was a challenge, and we had new stock arriving in all the time.
“One of the biggest challenges was when our brand new freezer went down and we had to transport 53 cartons of frozen product to the White Rock store, and then move it all back again.
“But, despite all these glitches, we were amazingly able to open on time for our April 19 grand opening date and open house. The customers have been absolutely fantastic, some regular customers, but a lot of new customers who are glad that we have opened up in this area.
“Our store is a destination and when customers come here they are not just coming to buy a chocolate bar, many are coming here to relive childhood memories of some of their favourite British groceries and sweets, and to see if we carry those items.”
Speaking about their wholesale division, Steve said, “Before we had the warehouse we would get five pallets of product at a time and there was no place to store them. It was just too much work for Lil.
“Now, we can receive 20 pallets and there is room where we can unpack them when we have time.
“But it also makes it very convenient for our customers. Before, we had to wait for the stock to come in and then ship it out. Now, whether it’s a retail or wholesale customer, I can ship almost the next day from the warehouse.
“We’re getting many retail customers also ordering wholesale. This works to their advantage as they get a volume discount because we don’t have to handle it two or three times.
“We also have about a dozen retail stores that buy from us on a regular basis and we ship all over Canada.
“We’re also thinking of expanding into some of the European food lines such as the Danish and French products, which would complement the English lines.”
There are always new and exciting products being added to the inventory at Celtic Treasure Chest.
Some of the new items on their shelves include: curry powders in different flavours; mushroom ketchup; new chutney flavours; and three new flavours of licorice – apple, black currant and strawberry.
The have also added new Border cookies from Scotland. I sampled the Border milk chocolate gingers and they were delicious!
You will need time to browse the aisles at Celtic Treasure Chest to really enjoy all the interesting treasures on their shelves.
These products have been especially selected by the McVitties and shipped overseas by container to Canada. You won’t find these unique British products in the large grocery chain stores.
The Celtic Treasure Chest locations are: 5639 Dunbar Street in Vancouver – call (604) 261-3688; 1534 Foster Street in White Rock – call (604) 538-2277; and #14 - 7550 River Road in Delta – call (604) 940-5366. Visit them online at: www.celtictreasurechest.ca.
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