Lidl — Supermarket in Kreuzberg, Berlin

This is a Lidl branch on Kottbusser Straße in Kreuzberg, a short walk from Prinzenstraße station. Walk in and the first thing you meet is the checkout area: a row of self-service tills doing most of the work, with regular lanes mostly shut.

The refrigerated section is where this branch earns a detour. Cold drinks sit there at prices that stay reasonable, rather than the expensive bottles that usually fill a supermarket fridge, and on a warm Kreuzberg afternoon that is the whole errand.

Since the renovation the aisles feel cramped, and the shopping carts are oversized for them, so a basket is the easier way round. The self-checkout tills throw up their share of problems: barriers close, an item needs clearing, and you wait five or ten minutes while a cashier sorts it out.

The people on the tills are the branch's better side, friendly and familiar with the regulars who come in daily. Staples go missing, though: organic chicken fillets, Skyr and Harz cheese are regularly gone, and frozen soup vegetables are not there at all.

Spend lands around €10 to €30 for a basket. Come before 10 pm on a weekday; Sunday the shutters are down. If the self-checkout queue stalls, the wait is the price of the low prices.