Greggs vs Pret lunchtime rivalry brutally exposes North-South divide

08 June 2023 , 19:53

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Greggs store in Cleethorpes (Image: GrimsbyLive/Donna Clifford)

It’s a tasty debate carving up the country.

The North-South Divide has long thought to be the Watford Gap. But now it’s where Pret A Manger coffee shops begin to dwindle and Greggs bakeries take over, according to mathematicians.

So why do Southerners seem to love the sandwich chain while those up North can’t wait to grab a pasty?

Here Mirror writers Clare Fitzsimons and Lydia Veljanovski, one Northern and one Southern, explain
the recipe of success for their regional favourites...

Greggs - Clare Fitzsimons

It's the smell that gets you first. Warm buttery pastry, baking cakes and bread of every shape and size. Those sweet and savoury scents all scream: “Yum, come in and eat me now.”

Greggs, Costa & Pret coffees have 'huge differences in caffeine', says report

I challenge anyone to walk past a Greggs without being sorely tempted.

A Pret A Manger, however? Not so much. Yes, it might smell of coffee but I’ve always come away with a general sense of, well, beige.

A hit across the country, Greggs is particularly beloved in the north (NurPhoto via Getty Images)

Perhaps that’s the problem, everything’s just trying to be a little bit healthier, and without the calories there’s no character either.

You can keep your avocado in a sandwich and, yes, a protein pot might not pack the calorie punch a pasty does. But given the choice, you know you would.

Of course, Greggs is slowly (or actually not so slowly now) spreading South. I’m a Northerner but now live in London and there are two recently opened ones near my office alone.

But Pret still seems to be the shop of choice for a breakfast or lunch for most, despite the vastly different price tags.

Maybe the problem is that the Southern Greggs just don’t seem to do the REALLY amazing stuff. Yes, OK, a steak bake or a chicken slice is nice enough and nobody is going to turn one down (veggies excluded), but where are the corned beef pasties? Or the corned beef pies?

Clare adores a pasty

Some Southerners don’t even know they exist. Well, you are missing out. Big time. Warm corned beef and potato wrapped in pastry... unbeatable.

And that’s not all. Where are the stottie sarnies? A big quarter of a stottie (that’s a massive round flat bread bun), stuffed with ham salad, delicious.

That’s not to say the offerings in all their Southern shops aren’t fabulous. Bacon or sausage baps, cheese and onion pasties, every doughnut imaginable and their famous sausage rolls. Not to mention the vegan sausage roll which caused such a stir. Having been persuaded to eat one against my better judgement, I have to admit it wasn’t that bad.

Costa Coffee cappuccino has four times the amount of caffeine as a Red Bull

Not a patch on a corned beef pasty though.

When you know, you know. Though on second thoughts, maybe us Northerners should just keep that secret to ourselves after all. Now when’s the next train back home?

Pret a Manger - Lydia Veljanovski

I literally wouldn’t exist without Pret, and I am not being overly dramatic. In 1988 my parents met in the first Pret A Manger in London’s Westminster, then just a singular sandwich shop.

I imagine it was like an American rom-com where they both reached for the same croissant, and locked eyes. Love at first bite.

I found out about how they met long after my own love affair with Pret began. As a child, growing up in London, I would sometimes be treated to a BLT with my mum on a day out.

Pret is popular in the south (PA)

Nowadays I’m a pescatarian who unfortunately has to buy her own sandwiches, but Pret is still my cafe of choice.

It’s the range that gets me, far more varied than Greggs. From the curried chickpea and mango wraps, to crayfish salads and salted caramel pots, there is a snack for every mood.

It’s also healthy enough that you only have to feel guilty about the price, not the calories.

But although their food, like everything, has risen in price in the cost of living crisis, at least money spent there is more ethical than most.

Apart from a small blip where it was partially bought by McDonald’s, Pret is a company with a good heart. It uses Fairtrade produce and staff recently received their third wage rise in a year.

Lydia loves a coffee and snack from Pret (PA)

Food outlets have cited red tape and fear of litigation as reasons for creating waste, but for more than 30 years Pret has donated excess food to the homeless. This isn’t to say that Greggs isn’t great too, just it’s not as great.

While I love a vegan sausage roll as much as the next man – as long as the next man isn’t Piers Morgan who hates them – I consider it a hangover treat.

I realise to many this will make my view as flaky as the pastry on a steak bake, but I have listened to endless monologues about the merits of Greggs. My Middlesbrough-born boyfriend talks about the bakery chain with fanaticism usually reserved for religious cult members.

Don’t even get him started on the Greggs in Newcastle where everything is “75% off”.

But maybe, that’s just it. The North-South divide boils down to nostalgia. Or maybe I just like an avocado wrap more than a pasty, and will have to accept that I’m a soft Southerner… just as soft as the bread they use at Pret.

Clare Fitzsimons