Welcome to QE Foodstores
We are an independent Australian family-owned business dedicated to giving our customers a quality shopping experience at all our 11 stores.
The customer is at the heart of everything we do – every day. We know our community have busy lives and want to access nourishing fresh food every day.
We make it easy for our customers to purchase quality food and groceries and to be able to shop locally.
That’s why we call ourselves QE Foodstores. QE stands for Quality and Easy. Our purpose is to make “Quality Food Shopping Easy”
We want to deliver our customers a quality shopping experience and to stand out from the rest of the market. We really care and take great pride in delivering a premium product range and the freshest fruit and veg direct from Sydney markets at very competitive prices.
Looking for juicy fruit, market-fresh vegetables, artisan bread, fresh meat, gourmet brands, fresh & frozen meals or specialized products such as organic and gluten free? Easy, we stock over 6000 grocery lines and we cater to our local community needs as they arise. If you need something you can ask our friendly staff and we will endeavor to source for you if we can.
The community is very important to us here at QE Foodstores and we give back in a variety of ways. We partner with Oz Harvest and the Food pantry. We sponsor the Balmain Fun Run, provide fruit in local school programs and contribute to local community events.
We love delighting our customers. We welcome you to visit us soon and see for yourself.
Buy local. Buy Fresh. Enjoy the QE Foodstores quality shopping experience.
Our Story
The QE Foodstores story started in Sydney in July 2002.
I headed to Australia as a 19 year old from New Zealand with a big dream to set up a business with money saved by my family. I didn’t know what type of business or where but I was tenaciously committed to setting up a business for my family.
With no work history, limited school education and a history of picking kiwifruit and working on orchards and farms. I soon found rejection was a common theme. No landlord was willing to trust a 19 year old, with no experience. To save money I slept in my car.
In Darlinghurst Sydney I got my first break when I found a rundown business for sale. Fortunately, the landlord was Bill Anton himself a young migrant from Greece, who was willing to sign the lease for me. I had my business.
Starting a new business is tough – I worked hard and long 16 hour days , 7 days a week. It was a frustrating time and I remember one Wednesday evening almost 2 years after launch when the street outside was busy and our store was only making enough to keep our head above water. It wasn’t a lack of hard work I realized something else was clearly missing.
My brother came over from NZ to help me in 2006 and I had grown to love Sydney so was determined to build a successful business.
I have a passion for learning about business and soon learned that to succeed I needed help from a business coach and other key advisors. We worked on our brand marketing and had a goal to create the best small supermarket in Sydney. We called it 7 Star supermarkets.
I love fresh food and going to the Sydney markets is something I still do today – it’s my passion to pick the best and freshest produce for our customers. I also love to see our customers delight in the taste, freshness, and price of our fruit and veg. This was a key factor in developing our discriminating offer for our customers.
This was the start of our QE Foodstores promise… quality food shopping made easy.
Our quality product offer and clear fresh positioning helped our Darlinghurst store grow and we were able to expand and open a second store in Newtown. A new learning experience as we started a new store from scratch with lots of mistakes and insights along the way.
For various reasons, we had to change our company name. This was a great opportunity to simplify our promise of Quality Food Shopping Easy. QE Foodstores was created and it steered our company with a very clear purpose and promise.
People are a very special part of QE’s success. In the early days, there was just my brother and I. Today we employ 130 staff in the QE team. Our team has built a special culture where we all work hard to deliver a better experience for our customers and supporting each other in doing so. A special focus has been on developing the leadership and management skills within all our team.
We have a great team of staff, external consultants and suppliers.
QE Foodstores is a proud family owned business. Support from my family has always been great with my mum Jaswinder Kaur pushing me harder than anyone else I know. I never forget the belief they showed in me way back when I started this journey.
In 2020 we now offer the QE promise to 11 communities in Sydney … Darlinghurst, Newtown, Camperdown, Bronte, Randwick, Balmain, Waterloo, Oxford St, Milsons Point, Paddington and our Newest store St Leonards. And we are always looking for new communities to serve.
We are very proud to have developed and nurtured thousands of loyal customers who continue to choose QE Foodstores and inspire us to do better every day.
Quality food shopping made easy is our purpose.
Narinder Singh
Founder QE Foodstores