Howick Village Grocer, at 33 Picton Street in Howick village, Auckland, is listed as an ice cream shop but trades, by all accounts, as a proper village store. Its 4.6 stars from 112 Google reviews rest on fresh produce, flowers and owners whose friendliness reviewers single out. A good neighbourhood grocer lives on turnover: produce that sells through in a day or two never sits long, so the busiest small shops can beat supermarkets on freshness and price at once. Cheese rewards the same logic — shops that carry imported cheeses and a real spread of varieties will usually cut to order and talk you through them. And a small, fast-moving ice cream cabinet is nearly always a better sign than an enormous one. On Picton Street, where the village still runs on regulars, it's the shop reviewers describe as feeling like home — fresh vegetables mostly cheaper than the supermarket, and a cheese range that keeps coming up in reviews.