Kai Co on the verge of second Christchurch supermarket as sales surge

Ethan Vickery, co-founder of Kai Co Supermarket at the Northwood Supa Centre in Christchurch. Photo / Mike Thorpe

Nine months later, despite their extensive market research and knowledge of the fresh food trade, they’re in a position they hadn’t anticipated.

“We’ve probably had 33% growth in the last three months, which is massive, right? That’s what you’d look at over five years if you’re lucky,” Ethan says.

Evidence of their growing success can be seen in their need to replace broken shopping baskets, Shane says.

“We bought about 100 shopping baskets and we’re down to about 10 because people are breaking the handles because they’re buying too much meat and stuff.

“And our 100 litre trolleys aren’t big enough, so we’ve just ordered some 200 litre ones. People are doing quite big shops, which is awesome because it’s increased our average spend, but it is an indication that people are getting the whole shopping requirement, or most of their shopping requirements from us.”

Not only is the shopping spend increasing, so is the number of shoppers.

“We’re rapidly approaching 10,000 customers a week, which is way in excess of what we anticipated. We’d anticipated 5000 to 6000.

“We’re getting hammered by agents and mall owners and developers about, you know, ‘come to our site’ and it’s pretty cool to be able to say that you’ve got that sort of foot traffic when you’re negotiating leases,” Shane says.

Ethan and Shane Vickery, owners of independent Christchurch supermarket Kai Co. Photo / Mike Thorpe

They’ve decided the time is right for another store and are in the throes of signing a lease to open their second Christchurch operation. Shane says it will be significantly larger than their first store.

“About a third bigger than this one, as far as a footprint goes. No need for us to increase the out-the-back space, but retail area, we’ll lift that by about 400 square metres or something. It enables us to look at alcohol for the next one,” Shane says before Ethan interjects.

“And fresh fish,” Ethan says. “I think we’ve realised if we want to be a serious competitor, you’ve got to offer everything, right? Because people are so time poor. If you can eliminate as many stops as possible.

“It won’t be a focus, but it’ll be there for people who need it.”

Shane says fresh fish could set them apart from many supermarkets.

“We’re looking at partnering up with a family that’s been doing it in Christchurch for 70 years.”

Kai Co Supermarket at Northwood Supa Centre, Christchurch. Photo / Supplied

The location of that store remains a secret for now, but the Vickerys are less guarded about their future plans – and they’re just getting started.

“We’ve got a really supportive bank and they’re supporting us to roll out potentially another five [Kai Co stores] in the next two, two and a half years or so,” Shane says.

Shane and Ethan smile when asked what they’ve learned over the past nine months.

They say their future stores will differ from the original. The career butchers came into the supermarket game with an obvious strength in fresh food, but dealing with grocery suppliers was new and it took time to form relationships and gain trust.

“Ethan’s been doing some fantastic work dealing directly with suppliers and getting as many of them on board as possible. Still have a good relationship with Woolworths wholesale supply, and I think they’re doing a pretty good job of honouring their commitment. Maybe others need to look at themselves and do a bit better,” Shane says.

With food prices looming as a hot topic for the upcoming election and the potential threat of a Foodstuffs split in 2027, the co-operative has suggested the move could in fact backfire and drive prices up.

Dean Waddell, Foodstuffs NI chairman.

Foodstuffs North Island chairman and Pak’nSave Tauranga owner Dean Waddell told Newstalk ZB’s Mike Hosking Breakfast that, despite apparent broad political support for the plan, Foodstuffs would “have to fight this”.

“Our history is full of independent owners coming together to create economies of scale to be competitive for customers. Potentially unwinding our business makes us less competitive,” Waddell said.

Ethan Vickery isn’t convinced pitting New World against Pak’nSave would make much difference as they already cater to different markets.

“What it will help is suppliers, like small to medium-sized suppliers. Because at the moment, you’re only talking to three different buying teams. Your Woolworths team and South and North Island Foodstuffs teams.

“So you’ve got 82% of groceries consumed in New Zealand, dictated by three teams of people. So, if you have more teams – that can’t be a bad thing.”

Kai Co Supermarket at the Redwood Supa Centre in Christchurch. Photo / Mike Thorpe

Ethan believes the market needs more small players like Kai Co, with lower overheads who can disrupt the bigger chains. Shane says the Government should further incentivise start-ups like theirs.

“I think the Government has made a great start in offering that 20% immediate write-off for depreciation for new business asset purchases.

“For someone like us, if you could get your asset purchases written off in say the first year – I’m talking purely about incentivising grocery, another player – you could then reinvest that capital quite quickly because you’re not paying tax on your profitable first store yet because you’re writing off all the depreciation and setting up the next one.

“When that one’s set up, you’ve already written off your assets here, so the Government’s getting the tax straight away on your profit from that first one now.

“I’m not an accountant, but I can see how something like that would really help us,” Shane says.

Ethan says Kai Co won’t cost or lose jobs at the checkout; it’s one of their mottos that “staff add value”.

“We will never have self-service checkouts. We want people to have that conversation. We want to have that customer experience. We’re not going to have a night fill because we want people shopping through our store and be able to talk to our staff,” Ethan says.

Details on the location of the second Kai Co store are likely before Christmas.

Mike Thorpe is a senior multimedia journalist for the Herald, based in Christchurch. He has been a broadcast journalist across television and radio for 20 years and joined the Herald in August 2024.