A box of ShopRite cereal was the wrong choice for a shocked shopper — it was infested with insects.

Clifford Somersall was stunned when he opened the box of Oats & Honey cereal and spotted movement inside the sealed bag.

Mr Somersall, from St George’s, said: “At first I wasn’t certain,

“I thought I was seeing things, but I know there’s nothing wrong with my eyesight.

“As soon as I opened it they came up. There is a first time for everything, but you never expect that.”

He said there were dozens of the creepy crawlies inside the bag.

Mr Somersall bought the cereal from MarketPlace on Church Street in Hamilton earlier this month.

He said both the box and the inside bag were sealed and the cereal was not past its sell-by date.

Mr Somersall added: “I bought it on the Saturday morning and in the afternoon I opened it up and I noticed the uninvited guests in the box.

He said he had taken the box back to the shop, which gave him a refund — but that it was enough to convince him to try a different brand.

“I couldn’t believe it,” he said. “It caught me off-guard, and it turned me off for a while. You lose your appetite when you see something like that.”

A spokesman for MarketPlace said the company had taken the complaint seriously and also contacted its suppliers about the problem.

He added: “We set ourselves very high standards for the quality and safety of our food.

“We have apologised to our customer as well as given him a full refund and, as a gesture of goodwill, some additional products.

“We continue to investigate his complaint with our supplier and remain diligent on holding our standards high.”

A spokeswoman for ShopRite did not reply to request for comment by press time.