Staff and shoppers have been welcomed back to a supermarket in Ashford, which has reopened following a fire on Monday morning.

Lidl supermarket in New Street was back up at running with four open tills first thing today and brand new stock following Monday's fire.

Teams of workmen and staff were seen carrying out repairs and cleaning inside the store this week.

The store reopened today at 8am to a queue of 50 customers outside and a special guest appearance from Father Christmas.

It opened ahead of schedule after the company initially announced it would be temporarily closed until the new year.

Mark Henry, regional director at Lidl, said: "There's been a phenomenal support from our customers and the staff have been phenomenal in making sure that we can get the store open.

"I can say that its been a massive team effort and we have done a lot in the last few days to get this store completely cleared of stock and restocked.

"The customers are very happy and we're very busy right, from eight o'clock this morning when we opened.

"Everybody was just really grateful. I've had one customer come up to me today saying 'You've saved my Christmas!'

"The staff have really pushed to get this store open. The store staff in particular have been really working together in shifts and in teams over the last 48 hours to make sure that we could get the store complete cleared clean and back up and running.

"Also a big thanks to the local fire brigade. If it wasn't for that, we would have no store here."

Firefighters were called at midnight on Monday to the blaze and battled the flames for two hours.

The fire was noticed by supermarket staff members who raised the alarm and evacuated the building.

Four engines arrived five minutes later, and used a thermal imaging camera to scan the single-storey building to pinpoint the source.

They used a hose reel jet to control the fire, after smoke had spread throughout the store and the Park Club gym next door.

Investigators believe the fire spread from one of the freezers in the store room to other stock, but say they are not treating it as suspicious.

Lidl remained closed on Tuesday and yesterday while staff moved damaged stock out of the shop.

A structural surveyor visited the store and said it was safe to open, but teams will continue work on the ceiling outside of store opening hours. The tiles have been removed and are set to be replaced in the new year.

The store had previously reopened in June 2014 after a lengthy refurbishment which took several months.

That revamp included adding a bakery, a new entrance and exit lobby as well as new cladding to make the building lighter and more modern in appearance.

A Lidl spokesman said: “The store team have done an absolutely incredible job alongside our contractors, which means that we are able to re-open earlier than anticipated.

"We’d really like to extend our thanks to all the teams at Lidl who have really pulled together and been instrumental in helping to get the store back up and running.

“All the stock from the store has been returned to the warehouse where we are currently assessing what is suitable to be redistributed to our other stores or donated to our charity partners. We can assure you that no edible food will unnecessarily go to waste.

“We’d like to thank our store colleagues and the emergency services for their swift action and response. Thankfully there were no injuries."