Presto – The Fresh Supermarket @ Citta Mall, Ara Damansara

Last weekend we were at Citta Mall for breakfast and noticed a new supermarket called Presto. Since it was quite a heavy breakfast we thought why not take a stroll through the supermarket to see what it has to offer. The supermarket’s layout is well presented, looks clean and tidy with a welcoming atmosphere.

The usual groceries, personal care and household items could be found here but Presto strongly focus on imported products like fruits, vegetables, snacks and beverages – especially the last two. So this is a small haven for adventurous food lovers (like me) looking to try new brands that the usual chain supermarkets don’t carry. As for me, I am always on the hunt for new instant noodle flavors.

Presto’s tagline is ‘The Fresh Supermarket’ and this is clearly portrayed as the fruits and vegetable section greet customers as soon as they walk in. I like how the names of the different sections are displayed with big and bold letters, makes it easy to find what you want.

A small but well-stocked section is dedicated for organic products (sauce, grain, canned) could be found near the fruits, just on your left as soon as you enter.

Seafood, meat and sushi section.

I always find it hard to look for really fresh prawns in the major supermarkets but that’s not the case here at Presto. The seafood volume being sold might look small but at least they are fresh and healthy-sized. Besides the usual tiger prawns, white sea prawns (usually only sold in wet markets) are also available here.

Moving on would be the dairy section with plenty of cheese and butter brands to choose from. Next to it are some juices and carbonated drinks.

And you will never run out of milk again. Suddenly, cereal decisions are not so hard anymore.

The frozen section features a wide selection of ice creams, pizza, burger patties.. well you know the drill. But I wouldn’t have expected frozen Musang King durians to be sold here. That came really as a surprise for me.

These are probably only one-tenth of the choices of ice creams in Presto. The brands are pretty limited to certain countries though like US, New Zealand and Australia.

One of the best selling gelato brand in US made by Caffe Classico could be found here too. Gelato Classico is an ultra rich and creamy, hand-crafted Italian-style ice cream while the fat-free, dairy-free Sorbetto Classico is crafted with 80-90% high-quality fruit imported from all over the world.

And now to the snacks section where the goodies are imported mostly from Japan, Korea, Taiwan, China and Thailand. You will find a lot of tid bits, instant noodles, soft drinks and canned coffees. This section also contains some non halal products as well like chili sauce and bottled German sausages.

If there’s anything exclusive here it would be the Arnott’s biscuits and snacks, where a special dedicated section for these goodies is setup near the cashier. The selection here is one of the the widest I have come across so far and they even have the rare white chocolate version of Tim Tam biscuits for sale.

Orville Redenbacher’s gourmet popping corn is microwave-able and watch the bag transforms into a pop up bowl before your eyes. It is a truly innovative product.

Chips and dips.

An aisle dedicated for cereals, grains and snack bars. A few popular biscuits from UK could be found here too like Jammie Dodgers (shortbread with raspberry jam, extremely popular with children), Crawfords Garibaldi (currants filled golden crispy biscuits) and Jacob’s Fig Rolls (pastry filled with fig paste) – just to name a few.

Beans, pasta and macaroni.

I have always thought that Mövenpick only manufactures ice cream, which by the way is very good. Apparently I was wrong, they have a range of jams too.

Imported beers and wines with the latter arranged according to the countries of origin.

The bakery sells the usual commercialized loafs and an assortment of in-house baked pastries and European breads that are made fresh daily.

We tried some and they are not bad at all. I especially liked the chocolate mini roll and spicy tuna puff, both of them are tasty treats.

There is an Alterra brewer in the bakery too and it serves a variety of hot beverages like tea, coffee and chocolate. We tried the Sumatra and Rich Roast coffee @ RM4.50 each – decently smooth and not bitter at all even though they are supposed to be the strong variant.

Price wise, honestly speaking Presto is not the cheapest place to shop but the rewards they are offering currently (until December 2012) through their ‘Get Your Money Back’ program would easily outweigh the competitors. For example, if you spend RM80 in a single receipt, you will get two cash vouchers usable at FoodPanda.my (an online food delivery service) or Harvey Norman. It is almost like Presto is buying you a meal for shopping with them!
Besides that, Presto Card holders will get a flat discount on everything (except for cigarettes and promotional items) once a spending threshold is achieved in a month. If your total spending is RM300 or more per month, you will receive 2% discount as Silver Customer Level and this will increase to 4% max for Platinum level. Good riddance to those useless point system if you ask me, the redeemable items are usually quite awful. For a detailed explanation do refer the Presto Card page online. And if you are wondering, you will get the card free for life if you spend more than RM100 in a single receipt.

While we were in the supermarket we couldn’t help but notice some staff picking items into trolleys, it looked as though they were shopping too. After asking around, we realized that they were actually shopping for customers who purchased the goods online through Presto’s website, then deliver them to their doorstep. This got us curious and we surfed their online store on the spot. We found that everything you could buy in the physical store could be found in the online store too. Seems interesting enough and I think I will try shopping online instead next time.
Currently, Presto delivers to most areas in Klang Valley and that includes Subang, Shah Alam, Subang Jaya, PJ, Damansara, KL City and Ampang. They do charge a delivery fee but the more you buy, the cheaper it gets. And for any total order value that exceeds RM200, the delivery will be free of charge. Check out Presto’s delivery areas and fees in detail here.

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