The Co-op Group has opened a new ’on the go’ concept store in Manchester, featuring free in-store water taps for customers to fill their own bottles.

Located at Manchester Piccadilly station, the store also boasts a self-serve hot soup and porridge station, self-service tills, and extended ranges to appeal to health-conscious customers, vegetarians and vegans.

The group set to launch two further on the go concept stores in 2019, both located in London.

Northern divisional managing director, Derek Furnival, said: “Increased levels of space, range and options for self-serve in our new ‘On the Go’ stores offers our members and customers the ultimate convenient shopping experience.

“Located in areas of high-levels of footfall, these stores will serve time-poor shoppers that need to make quick purchases with ease. There will always be need for our traditional format stores, however the new concept stores allow us to serve our customers’ direct needs in specific locations where time is of the essence.”

The store is one of four recently acquired from Waitrose.