AN Ottery woman has thanked five members of staff from Sidmouth s Lidl store after they tried to unlock her car boot when she shut her keys in with her shopping.

AN Ottery woman has thanked five members of staff from Sidmouth's Lidl store after they tried to unlock her car boot when she shut her keys in with her shopping.

"There were five of them with fishing rods. Nothing was too much for them, they were so nice and spent so long there trying to get the door handle open," said Michaela Crockett, 47, from Raleigh Road, Ottery St Mary.

She went to the Woolbrook store last Wednesday afternoon after finishing work. Among the items she bought was a three-litre tub of ice cream.

"I put the keys down as I forgot to take my bag with me. I loaded up the trolley and transferred it to the boot.

"I have never done it before. It was a first and will be a last."

She said her car window was open an inch and staff and bystanders, including a blind man, tried to reach the boot button inside the car, which had central locking, but nothing would open.

Michaela asked a friend to pick up her son from Tipton St John Primary while she waited for the RAC to arrive to undo the boot, in case she couldn't get there in time.

"To him it was a piece of cake to undo," she said.

Lidls even exchanged her melted ice cream before she left the car park.

"I just wanted to say thank you to them. I am gobsmacked by their service," said Michaela, a regular shopper at the store.

Staff at Lidl were too modest to talk about the incident this week.