He’s known as “The Voice of Asda”.

But after more than a decade of meeting and greeting at the stores’s Gravesend branch Brian Deacon is leaving.

The former British Transport police officer, who was 70 on Sunday, said his fond farewells to staff and customers at the supermarket in Thames Way over the weekend.

Brian, who lives with wife Ann, 73, in Leander Road, Gravesend, said: “Call me old fashioned but I believe in the personal touch. The customer comes first and is always right.”

Brian also used to work for the London Electricity Board where he came in to close contact with the public

The father of two daughters said: “I did not even know what a greeter was but I think it was my experience in the retail trade which kept me in good stead for the job.

“In recent years, they got rid of my job, which is a shame, and I have been helping out on the self-scan tills.”

Brian will not be giving up work altogether. He has got a job as a welcomer officer at the Cobham Mausoleum.

He said: “I will have more spare time on my hands but no doubt my good lady wife will have a list of jobs for me I have been putting off. I shall be painting and decorating like a lunatic.”