• The final Coles community hour – which welcomed the elderly, the sick, and emergency workers into stores at 7am – will take place on Thursday.
• Instead nearly 200 Coles stores will begin opening an hour earlier at 6 am from Friday, while online shopping will be opened to all Australians.
• Chief operating officer Matt Swindells said the move came as supply returned “back to normal” following runs on items like toilet paper and flour.
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It’s the biggest return yet to normal operation from an Australian supermarket.

On Tuesday, Coles revealed it will be eliminating its ‘community hour’ of shopping, which had designated the first hour of trade for the elderly, the sick, and emergency and healthcare workers.

“With supply almost back to normal for essential groceries, Coles is reopening this hour to all customers again as well as opening earlier where we can, to make shopping more convenient for everyone in the community,” chief operations officer Matt Swindells said in a statement.

While Swindells noted the hour had proved popular, the supermarket giant is now welcoming shoppers of all stripes back into stores from Friday.

Given shortages are beginning to subside, Swindells said it is also appropriate it now began extending its opening hours again, with nearly 200 stores opening from 6am by the week’s end where state restrictions allow.

Meanwhile, online shopping will again be made available to the whole community.

“We’ve doubled our capacity in Coles Online so there is now more opportunity than ever for customers to either have their groceries delivered to their homes or collect them at their convenience,” Swindells said.

“As the government begins to look at easing restrictions, customers should remember that appropriate safety practices will still apply and ask all customers to support.”

It comes after both Coles and Woolworths implemented seven weeks of restrictions in response to customer runs on toilet paper and flour, dramatically slashing opening hours and restricting purchase numbers. Woolworths has yet to announce similar relaxation measures.

Ahead of the federal government’s review of its national restrictions on Friday, it looks like Australia may slowly be getting back to some semblance pre-pandemic life.

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