Check out Sarah's 20 years with supermarket giant's Hartlepool stores

Sarah Charteris, a store assistant at Aldi, first joined the supermarket back 2002 by starting off at the the town's Tees Bay Retail Park store before moving to the Dunston Road store in 2003 where she has remained ever since.

Over the years Sarah has also gone above and beyond her typical store duties by taking part in a range of fundraising activities.

These have included taking part in a store cyclothon fundraiser - where she and her colleagues cycled on a bike at the front of the store to help raise money for the firm’s chosen charity, The Teenage Cancer Trust, which works to support young people suffering from the disease and also trains and funds staff who are teenage cancer specialists.

Sarah said: “It has been a privilege to work at Aldi for 20 years and after working in the same store for much of that time, I have formed some life-long friends.

“I’ve loved working here and want to thank the customers and my amazing colleagues who make it such a great place to come to work every day.”

Sandy Mitchell, regional managing director at Aldi UK, said: “Without the hard work and dedication of our store colleagues, we wouldn’t be able to provide customers with the service we’ve become known for.

“Colleagues like Sarah are the cornerstone of our business and I would like to thank her for her continued dedication throughout the last 20 years.”