So much agreement! I have a bunch of obscure parts like 99 wooden dowels from when I needed one and had to buy 100.
Screwfix is sometimes OK for this, but I still end up in situations like the above where I have 99 wooden dowels that will remain in my garage for all time.
(For what it's worth, I also completely agree with Amazon vs stores like John Lewis etc, I haven't bought anything from Amazon for years now, and definitely don't miss it at all)
Big surprise when I moved to Germany was that there's a Woolworth's brand here that survived independently to the one in the UK which closed decades ago.
So much nostalgia for these shops. A man with a posh, sparkling clean apron knowing exactly what you need or mean. In and out in under a minute or two having parted with just 30p
Screwfix are actually pretty close in terms of service. Their staff are pretty patient with people and quite helpful. They mostly only sell packs of things though (and wow fixings got expensive... anyway. And it's ironic that the "trades" brand of the group that owns B&Q has better customer service than B&Q...)
The shop also sold more expensive things like small appliances and hand tools etc