A little lad who lost his sight due to a brain tumour has been given a “special” day-out at his local Asda store he regularly visits.
10-year-old Jacob – who sadly lost his sight when he was just 10 months old following a brain tumour – is known as a “little gem” to those who work at the Asda branch in Swinton, and is always chatting to his favourite colleagues when he goes into the store that’s just around the corner from his house twice a week with his mum Emma.
Rachel Howarth, the store’s ambient section manager who organised the visit, says everyone at the branch is so fond of Jacob – which is why staff decided to organise a special visit for him.
They wanted to treat him to a day he’ll never forget.
After promising Jacob that she’d get him his own Asda uniform for Christmas, Rachel not only decided to arrange this for him, but also to have his own lanyard and name badge, and give him the chance to go on the checkouts and speak over the tannoy too.
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“He’s such a lovely character and everyone knows him in the store,” Rachel explained.
“For Christmas, I promised to get him his own Asda uniform so he could wear it and come and join us and he was so happy with it, so Iarranged for him to come in when I was on a late shift and he had a go on checkouts.
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“He enjoyed the fuss and the chocolates he took home.”
Rachel also explained that although battling a brain tumour may have caused Jacob to lose his sight, this “does not stop this young man”, and that every time he goes into the store, he’s sure to tell staff all about what he’s been up to.
Staff arranged for Jacob to have his own lanyard and name badge, and the chance to go on the checkouts too / Credit: Asda
“He recently completed 10 lengths of the swimming pool at school and he plays the piano too – his disability certainly doesn’t stop him,” Rachel concluded.
Jacob’s mum Emma said she couldn’t thank the team at Asda Swinton enough for their kindness towards her son, adding: “I would just like to say a big thank you to everyone there as they have been absolutely brilliant and I couldn’t ask anymore from them.
“He loves going in and he wants to work there when he gets older.
Jacob visits the Asda Swinton store just around the corner from his house twice a week with his mum Emma / Credit: Asda
“He’s got an incredible memory and knows the colleagues by their voices – and he knows all their phone extension numbers too – so he had a great time on the checkouts as he loves scanning and going on the tannoy.
“People don’t believe me at first when I tell them that he can’t see, as he loves playing the piano and he’s just started playing the guitar more seriously and he’s very good at that too.
‘The average cost of a pint’ in the UK by region, according to the latest data
Danny Jones
Does it feel like pints keep getting more and more expensive almost every week at this point? Yes. Yes, it does, and while you can’t expect a city as big as Manchester to be one of the cheapest places to get one in the UK, we do often wonder how it compares to other parts of the country.
Well, as it happens, someone has recently crunched the numbers for us across the nation, breaking down which regions pay the most and the least for their pints.
The data has been examined by business management consultancy firm, CGA Strategy, using artificial intelligence and information from the latest Retail Price Index figures to find out what the ‘average cost of a pint’ is down south, up North and everywhere in between.
While the latest statistics provided by the group aren’t granular enough to educate us on Greater Manchester’s pint game exactly, we can show you how our particular geographic region is looking on the leaderboard at the moment.
That’s right, we Mancunians and the rest of the North West are technically joint mid-table when it comes to the lowest average cost of a pint, sharing the places from 3rd to 8th – according to CGA, anyway.
Powered by consumer intelligence company, NIQ (NielsenIQ) – who also use AI and the latest technology to deliver their insights – we can accept it might seem like it’s been a while since you’ve paid that little for a pint, especially in the city centre, but these are the stats they have published.
Don’t shoot the messenger, as they say; unless, of course, they’re trying to rob you blind for a bev. Fortunately, we’ve turned bargain hunting at Manchester bars into a sport at this point.
We might not boast the lowest ‘average’ pint cost in the UK, but we still have some bloody good places to keep drinking affordable.
London tops the charts (pretends to be shocked)
While some of you may have scratched your eyes at the supposed average pint prices here in the North West, it won’t surprise any of you to see that London leads the way when it came to the most expensive pint when it came to average cost in the UK.
To be honest, £5.44 doesn’t just sound cheap but virtually unheard of these days.
CGA has it that the average cost of a beer in the British capital is actually down 15p from its price last September, but as we all know, paying upwards of £7 for a pint down that end of the country is pretty much par for the course the closer you get to London.
Yet more reason you can be glad you live around here, eh? And in case you thought you were leaving this article with very little, think again…
Benson Boone has announced a headline gig in Manchester – and it’s a big one
Danny Jones
American pop sensation and unrivalled king of unnecessary front flips, Benson Boone, has just announced his first-ever headline Manchester arena gig as part of a new arena tour.
The solo artist and acrobatic chart-topper has seen a meteoric rise in the US and, as is usually the case across the Atlantic, he’s become increasingly popular over here too.
Benson may have performed here in Manchester before as part of the 2024 MTV EMAs and for a small show at The Deaf Institute, but now big fans have the added Boone of getting to watch a standalone show at one of Europe’s leading indoor entertainment venues.
Announced on Friday, 30 May, the 22-year-old will be making his way across the pond from Washington for a limited run of UK concerts, with a date at Co-op Live arena being one of just five dates.
Extending his ‘American Heart Tour’ ahead of the release of his eponymous sophomore record, with this autumn leg, Co-op Live will mark his individual visit to 0161.
The Grammy-nominated artist has earned several nods of recognition already for his first album, Fireworks & Rollerblades, which was released just last spring.
He has been described as among the current trend of male singers who fit into the American Idol and ‘Voice audition pop’ genre (a term recently coined online), along with the likes of Teddy Swims, Shawn Mendes, Alex Warren and others.
Regardless of the slightly tongue-in-cheek term, he’s become a huge hit around the world and landing him is still a big coup for the venue that has already welcomed similarly massive pop contemporaries like Swims, Sabrina Carpenter, Olivia Rodrigo and more.
In case you’re wondering just how big a deal he is over in the States, even this early in his career, his domestic headline dates sold out in seconds, quite literally…
The last time he visited Co-op Live was to perform at the most recent MTV EMAs
Benson Boone is coming to Manchester on Monday, 27 October and will be playing just two other British venues: The O2 in London (two nights) and the Utilita Arena in Birmingham.
Safe to say you don’t want to miss this one if you like soaring vocals and lots of flipping.
General admission tickets go live at 10am on Thursday, 5 June, but Co-op Members can gain access via the arena’s official pre-sale window from the same time on Tuesday (3 Jun).
Emily Sergeant -
4th April 2022 
