The Manchester City Centre BID Mystery Shopping Awards is an annual initiative run by Manchester City Centre BID to celebrate and benchmark customer service excellence across the city centre.

Each year, winners across multiple categories are announced at an Awards Breakfast, with radio personalities and special guests on hand to present the accolades.

The 2026 exercise has been conducted by ProInsight Mystery Shopping, covering hundreds of city centre businesses across categories including Health and Beauty, Technology, Food and Drink, and Fashion.

2026 Mystery Shopping Awards

The exercise took place during May and June. Winners were celebrated at a ceremony on Wednesday 15th July at The Stoller Hall.

Congratulations to the 2026 winners. The programme saw Outstanding! results:

• 248 businesses scored above 89%
• 100% service excellence by 70 BID businesses

Best of the Best 2026:

1. Fashion: Large Stores: Boss
2. Fashion: Foot Asylum
3. Boutique: Sunglasses Hut
4. Food & General Retail: Spar
5. Footwear: Barker by Brogue Trader, Clarks, Dune, Kurt Geiger
6. Health & Beauty: Jo Malone, L’Occitane, Molton Brown
7. Home & Lifestyle: Build-A-Bear, Clarendon Fine Art, Ecig, Merkur Casino, Whittard
8. Stationery & Books: Ryman
9. Wellbeing: Pure Gym, Seen, XF Gym
10. Bank & Building Society: Metro Bank, Natwest, Halifax, HSBC, Virgin Money
11. Advised Customer Service: Vispring
12. Technology: Apple
13. Jeweller: AP House, David M Robinson, Boodles, Ramsden, Tudor
14. Hospitality – Quick Service: Subway
15. Hospitality – Restaurant: Lucky Cat
16. Hospitality – Coffee/Takeaway: Gail’s Bakery
17. Hospitality – Casual Dining: Flight Club.

Best of the Best 2025:

1. Advised Customer Service: Emma – The Sleep Company
   Bank & Building Society: NatWest
2. Boutique: Yours Fashion
3. Large Stores: Frasers Group
4. Fashion: Mint Velvet
5. Footwear: Russell & Bromley
6. Home & Lifestyle: Warhammer
7. Coffee Shop/Takeaway: Krispy Kreme
8. Quick Service: McDonald’s (Manchester Arndale)
9. Casual Dining: Kingpins
10. Restaurant: Grand Pacific
11. Health & Beauty: LUSH (Manchester Arndale)
12. Technology: Sky
13. Jeweller: Boodles
14. Food & General Retail: Marks and Spencer
15. Wellbeing: King Street Gym
16. Stationery & Books: Waterstones (Manchester Arndale).

This is a testament to the hard work and dedication of everyone contributing to the success of Manchester’s retail, leisure and office sectors.

See the 2026 Photos 

See the 2025 photos (PC: Fiona Finchett)