A CONVENIENCE shop in South East Cornwall has been crowned the best in the country.

Spar, at Pelynt, near Looe, was named top shop at the Robert Wiseman Dairies' neighbourhood shop of the year awards on Thursday night.

The family business has been run by generations of the Boxall family for 80 years and Fernley and Molly Boxall have run the store for more 40 years.

Together with son Paul and his wife Sophie, they impressed judges with their mix of excellent convenience retailing, services to the community and forward thinking.

With ramps to allow those less able to access the shop and a home delivery service which completes early morning runs to deliver newspapers and milk, the store stood out among the hundreds it was competing with.

Paul and Sophie Boxall collected the award at a ceremony in Loch Lomond on Thursday night.

Sandy Wilkie, Wiseman sales and marketing director, said: "Congratulations to the Boxall family and Spar Pelynt.

"We have seen some excellent examples of convenience retailing as we judged the 28 finalists but Spar Pelynt stood out for its excellent standards of retailing and customer service, services to the local community and ambition to keep driving the business forward to provide the best for its customers."

After being nominated by customers, Spar Pelynt underwent a rigorous judging process along with the other 27 national finalists. This included being visited by mystery shoppers who judged the stores against strict criteria including friendliness of staff, merchandising and product range. Finally the store was visited by national judges Mr Wilkie and David Sands, this year's independent judge and one of Scotland's top convenience retailers with 27 outlets across the country.

Mr Sands added: "After seeing all the 28 finalists, it has been a tough decision to pick the winner, but Spar Pelynt went that extra mile in all it does for its customers."