UK shop timelines, numbers of stores – For Tesco only

 

Fop other stores, see Supermarket timelines – non-Tesco

 

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Tesco

 

Tesco House, PO Box 18, Delamere Road, Waltham Cross, Hertfordshire, EN8 9SL, 01992 632 222.

www.tesco.com

 

Tesco general chronology

(see below for Tesco international expansion)

(see below for Tesco corporate takeovers and sales)

(see below for product diversification)

(see below for Tesco store numbers)

(see below for Tesco CSR initiatives)

 

The start of Tesco

Founder Jack Cohen began, in 1919, selling NAAFI surplus vegetables from a stall in East London after investing his £30 serviceman’s gratuity after serving in the Flying Corps.  On the first day he made £1 profit.

In 1929 Cohen began selling his groceries from fixed shops.  The name Tesco first appeared on a lock-up store in Burnt Oak, near Edgware, north London. The name ‘Tesco’, derived from T E Stockwell (Jack Cohen’s tea supplier) and Jack Cohen, was first used on tea, in 1924.  In the 1930s, Tesco moved into fixed shop premises in the new London suburbs, at cheap rents.

The move to self-service

1946, Jack Cohen visited the USA and was impressed by the self-service system at their supermarkets. This enabled more people to be served faster, with lower labour costs.  In 1950, The Tesco branch in St Albans, small by 21st century standards (200 square metres) was the first Tesco to be converted to self service.  This, or the Sainsbury Croydon branch, also converted to self service in 1950, was the UK’s first self-service supermarket.

The move to supermarkets

1956, Tesco opened its first supermarket, in a former cinema at Maldon, Essex.

1961 Tesco opened a 1,600 square metre (sales area) supermarket in Leicester, which was in the Guinness Book of Records as the largest store in Europe

1967, Tesco opened a 9,600 square metre store at Westbury, Wiltshire; this was exceptionally large for its time.

1968 The term ‘superstore’ was first applied to a Tesco store; to its branch at Crawley, West Sussex.

The abolition of RPM (Tescopolitics)

1960s, Tesco lobbied Parliament to have RPM (Resale Price Maintenance) abolished, its efforts supported by Edward Heath. RPM had forbidden retailers, who could buy in bulk, from undercutting the prices of smaller shops, so protecting smaller retailers. Large retailers such as Tesco got around this by issuing stamps with purchases, and these stamps could be redeemed for catalogue goods, an effective discount.

1964, Parliament in the UK passed the Resale Prices Act, abolishing RPM. By 1979, RPM only remained on books and pharmaceutical goods.

Tesco; the modern era

1973. The oil price shock led to a three-day week in the UK, and a recession. Tesco responded by ditching Green Shield Stamps and replacing them with lower prices. Green Shield Stamps finally disappeared in 1979.

1979, Terry Leahy joined Tesco, as a marketing executive.

1982, Tesco first used computerised checkouts. Tesco had 70 ‘superstores’.

1985, Tesco opened its 100th superstore (in Brent Park, Neasden, London)

1991 Tesco became Britain’s biggest independent petrol retailer. Offering cheap petrol was one way the supermarkets could persuade more customers with cars to come and shop there.

1992, Tesco began opening small format ‘Metro’ stores, the first was at Covent Garden, central London. This was to catch the office worker and tourist trade, people who might not have the time to shop at a larger supermarket.

1994 Tesco began opening ‘Express’ stores.  The first was on a garage forecourt in Barnes, south-west London.

1994 Tesco launched its Clubcard, a loyalty card giving shoppers effectively 1% off their shopping bill, or more if there were special bonus points awarded. These loyalty cards were once seem by the supermarkets as a way of persuading shoppers to stick with one store, hence the name, but shoppers simply obtained all the ‘loyalty cards’ going and continued to use different stores. However the main value of the card to the shop was that, linked to other electronic data such as credit card addresses, it gave a detailed profile of shopper habits and preferences, even the times they shopped. This could be used to target the supermarket’s own direct mailing, or the information could be sold as a valuable commodity to other marketers. Also, the cards initially produced more information than the supermarkets could possibly handle, although rapid advances in computer processing power are ameliorating that problem. Nevertheless, some stores have dropped their loyalty cards in favour of the competitive edge of lower prices.

1996, Tesco overtook Sainsbury in market share to become the UK’s biggest supermarket.

1997, Tesco opened the first of its ‘Extra’ format large stores at Pitsea, Essex. This store had around 10,000 square metres sales area.

1998, Following a deregulation of UK shop opening hours in 1987, Tesco now had 28 stores opening 24 hours a day except Sundays, when a maximum of six hours opening were now allowed.

March 1999, Tesco now had 83 stores on 24-hour opening.

2000, Tesco launched Tesco.com.

8/2000 Tesco now had 230 stores open ’24 hours’. The 1950 Shops Act had prohibited Sunday opening or shops open after 8pm on weekdays. Only ‘perishable items’ could be sold on a Sunday. In practice, small ‘corner’ shops widely flouted this restriction, and local councils turned a blind eye, but the Act was enforced for larger shops. In any case, what was ‘perishable’ was highly complex to define, and led to anomalies such as it being legal to sell periodicals, such as pornographic magazines, on a Sunday, but not books, for example Bibles. The 1950 Shops Act was repealed in 1994, and Sunday opening allowed for up to 6 hours. Thereafter, many large supermarkets were open from Monday morning to Saturday evening, and from 10-4, or less often 11-5, on Sundays.

5/2003, TESCO ENTERED THE TOP TEN OF WORLD RETAILERS.  It leapt from no.11 in 2002 to 8th in 2003, due to a series of acquisitions and worldwide expansion as well as organic growth.  Non-UK trade now accounts for 18% of Tesco’s total sales.

8/2004. Tesco now sells 840 million litres of milk a year, 12% of all milk sold in the UK.

2/2005, Verdict reported that Tesco had, by end-2004, a 5% share of local convenience-store food retailing, up 1% in a year; in 1999 Tesco had just 0.9% of neighbourhood food retailing. This put Tesco just behind the shares of the Co-op (5.5%), Spar (5.4%), and Musgrave (5.3%) (Musgrave has gained market share by its takeover of Londis). Somerfield had a 3.1% share of local food retailing.

2/2006 Tesco announced plans to open ‘hundreds’ of convenience stores, similar to its successful ‘Express’ format in the UK, on the west coast of the USA.  UK retailers have frequently faced difficulties on attempting an entry into the US market, but anti-monopoly policies in Europe have restricted Tesco’s available avenues for expansion.  The first Tesco US stores are to open in late 2007 in southern California, Arizona, and Nevada (Financial Times, 28 June 2007, p.9).  Most of the new stores will be in the prosperous suburbs of cities like Los Angeles, San Diego, Phoenix, and Las Vegas.  However some Tesco stores will be in deprived, mainly Hispanic-populated, inner suburbs, far from existing major supermarkets, where there are only small independent stores with high food prices.  Many of these independent stores will likely be forced to close, even as the more efficient ones reduce prices and improve their offering to try and match Tesco.  On average, local grocery prices in these deprived neighbourhoods will fall, but some people may have a longer journey to get their daily foodstuffs.

12/2009, Tesco began re-fascia-ing some of its garage forecourt stores to the One-Stop format.  Tesco acquired the One Stop fascia in 10/2002 when it bought the T & S chain; as detailed below (see Tesco corporate takeovers and sales), some One Stop fascias were retained, although under Tesco ownership.  There were suspicions that this would facilitate Tesco charging higher prices at these smaller stores than if they were fascia-ed as Tesco, since many shoppers are unaware that Tesco in fact owns One Stop (The Grocer, 19/12/2009, p.10).

 

Tesco international expansion (see also Tesco corporate takeovers and sales)

 

1994 Tesco entered Hungary, by purchasing the Globus chain.  This was Tesco’s first entry into Eastern Europe.

1995 Tesco entered Poland, by purchasing the Savia chain.  The first Tesco suypermarket in Poland was a 10,000 square metre store in Wroclaw, which opened on 18 November 1998.  By 2009 Tesco had 301 stores, with 24,780 staff, in Poland.

1996 Tesco entered the Czech Republic and Slovakia.

1997 Tesco entered Ireland.

11/1997, Tesco opened its second hypermarket in Hungary.

1997 Tesco entered Thailand.

1999 Tesco entered South Korea.

2000 Tesco entered Taiwan.

2001 Tesco entered Malaysia

2003 Tesco entered Turkey and Japan.

2004 Tesco entered China.

2007, January, Tesco opened a store in China, in the eastern suburbs of Beijing.  This store was under the Tesco fascia; Tesco also owned 90% of the Chinese Hymall chain of 46 stores, which will soon also be re-fascia-ed as Tesco.

2007, Tesco entered the USA.  It opened Fresh and Easy stores, the first was in California.  However by early 2009 there were signs that the Fresh and easy format was not doing as well as Tesco first hoped.  The Credit Crunch, which began in the US as households there began to default on over-extended mortgages, did not help; it was also possible that Tesco researchers had overestimated the balance of fresh food as against frozen ready meals consumed by US households (see ‘Marketing’, 4/3/2009, p.20).

2008, Tesco began operating its smaller Express format in China; the first such store was in Shanghai.

2008, Tesco was considering entering Russia, as consumer wealth and spending rose rapidly there.  Problems include bureaucracy and the large distances between major cities, creating difficulties in setting up cost-efficient distribution networks.

 

Tesco corporate takeovers and sales

 

The UK

1955 Tesco bought Burnards, with 50 London stores.

1957, Tesco bought Williamsons, with 70 stores.

1959 Tesco bought Harrow Stores, with 20 branches.

1960 Tesco bought John Irwins, with 212 stores in the north west of England.

1964 Tesco bought Charles Phillips, with 97 stores.

1968 Tesco bought the Victor Value chain, with 280 stores.

1986, Tesco sold the Victor Value chain of supermarkets.

1987, 15 May, Tesco bought the Hilliards chain of 40 supermarkets for £223 million.  Hilliards, a Yorkshire-based company, then had a market share of around 1%.

1993, Tesco bought the Catteau chain, France, for £150 million.

9/1993, Tesco bought the William Low chain of supermarkets for £257 million. William Low was based in Dundee and had 57 stores in Scotland and northern England.

1994, Tesco bought a £20 million share in the Global chain, Hungary.

1997, Tesco bought the Lotus chain of supermarkets, 13 supermarkets, in Thailand.

1997, Tesco bought Powers (Ireland), for £643 million.

10/2002 Tesco bought the T & S chain of 1,202 convenience stores in the UK for £377 million.  The T & S fascia (One Stop, Day and Nite) was retained in certain stores where conversion to a full Tesco Express format was difficult. Difficulties might include the store being too small, being built on a multi-level basis, lacking adequate car parking, or being somewhat run-down.

1/2004 Tesco bought the Adminstore company, 45 stores, for £54,000,000, giving it control of fascias such as Europa, Cullens, and Harts (Guardian, 23/1/04, p.22).  The premises will be rebranded as Tesco Express.  Many of these stores are in the more affluent areas of west London, promising rich pickings for Tesco.

Adminstore was founded by Mr Jitu Patel, whose first shop opened in 1979, and it bought the Europa chain in1985.  Because Tesco only has 5% of the grocery convenience market, the deal was unlikely to be referred to the Competition Commission.  However Bill Grimsey, Chief Executive of the Big Food group, owners of Iceland supermarkets, hit back at this, saying that this ‘5%’ is a fiction; in reality Tesco has a huge share of the total UK grocery market.  Mr Grimsey wants the Competition Commission to look at the overall UK grocery market share of Tesco, not its convenience market share.  The Tesco purchase was also opposed by the Association of Convenience Stores and the Federation of Wholesale Distributors.

 

Ireland

1979, Tesco bought the Three Guys chain

1997 Tesco Ireland was formed from the Tesco acquisitions of Quinnsworth and Crazy Prices, together known as Power Supermarkets Ltd.

2006, 39 stores

2009, 100 stores

 

Poland

11/1995, Tesco bought Savia, a chain of 36 stores.

6/2002, In Poland Tesco bought the HIT chain from Dohle Gruppe, gaining 13 hypermarkets.  Tesco was expanding into eastern Europe, a growth area since the fall of Communism. Poland, with a large population and potential economies of scale, was especially attractive. 

2003, Tesco had 66 stores in Poland

2006, Tesco bought Casino’s (French supermarket) Polish stores, the ‘Leader’ chain.  Casino had sold these to cut the debt it owed.

2006, 80 stores

2009, 301 stores

 

France

12/1992, Tesco bought the Catteau chain of 90 supermarkets in France.

2/1998, Tesco sold the Catteau chain (France).

 

Hungary

6/1994 Tesco bought 51% of Global (a chain of 43 stores)

1996 Tesco bought 6 stores from K-Mart.

2003, Tesco had 53 stores in Hungary

2006, Tesco had 88 stores in Hungary, generating sales of around £500 million a year. Czech shoppers spend (2006) around £800 a year on food, and are very price-conscious (Daily Mail, p.76, 24/10/06)

 

Czech Republic (including Slovakia before these two countries split)

1994, Tesco bought the K-Mart chain of 13 stores.

2003, 17 stores

2006, 27 stores

12/2007, 93 stores

 

Slovakia

2003, 17 stores

2006, 31 stores

 

Turkey

2003 Tesco bought a majority stake in the small (5-store) Turkish supermarket chain Kipa. Tesco aims for 30 supermarkets and convenience stores in Turkey by early 2007, generating sales of £250 million annually (Daily Mail, p.76, 24/10/06), and says there may be scope for over 200 Tesco shops there eventually.

2006, 6 stores

 

India.  Tesco is expanding into India.  By 2010 it had become supplier to Star Bazaar, the retail part of the Tata group, and also has plans for its own Tesco cash and carry stores in India for late-2010.

 

Thailand

1997, Tesco bought a 75% share of the Lotus chain of 13 supermarkets in Thailand; the company’s first venture into Asia.  Lotus stores have aisles selling food offerings for monasteries.  However the Thai government is (since ca. 2000) resisting foreign supermarket expansion into its retail sector.

2006, 217 stores

2009, 476 stores

 

China

7/2004. Tesco expanded into China by buying £140 million for a 50% stake in the supermarket chain Hymall (Daily Telegraph 15/7/04, p.31). Hymall opened its first store in 1998 and is (2004) owned by Ting Hsin, a Taiwanese company itself owned by Ting Cao. In 2004, Hymall had 25 hypermarkets in China, including 10 in Shanghai, and has plans to open 10 more per year. Because of its recent accession to the WTO, China has begun to lift restrictions on foreigner investment in its companies. Under Tesco, Hymall is expanding; it plans to open a further 10 hypermarkets in 2005, to add to the 29 it already (12/2004) leases in east and northeast China, including 11 in Shanghai (Daily Telegraph, 29/12/04, p.27).

In 3/2007 Tesco opened a store in the eastern suburbs of Beijing, in partnership with Legou stores.

2006, 39 stores

2009, 71 stores.  18 more hypermarkets to open by February 2010.

 

Taiwan

2000, Tesco bought 1 Makro store.

2006, 6 stores

 

South Korea

1999 Tesco entered a partnership with Samsung.

4/1999, Tesco bought Homeplus, with its 2 stores.

4/2006, Tesco is to bid for Carrefour’s stores in South Korea (Times Business, 14/4/06, p.62). Tesco is now no.2 retailer in S Korea with 55 stores, including 36 hypermarkets, behind the leader E-Mart. Acquiring Carrefour’s stores would make it no.1 in S Korea.

2006, 60 stores

 

Japan

7/2003 Tesco bought the C-Two-Network, a chain of 78 convenience stores in Tokyo, costing Tesco £140 million.

2004, Tesco bought the bankrupt Fre’c chain.  Fre’c was a chain of 27 local grocery stores in Tokyo.  The fresh-food chain had annual sales of £146 million in the year to March 2003, but debts of £53 million.  The Japanese State backed Industrial Revitalisation Corporation (IRC) is handling the sale to Tesco.  The IRC is attempting to get the majority of Fre’c debtors to write off their loans, but Tesco will take on a debt of around £16 million with the Fre’c stores.  Tesco hopes to cash in on Fre’c’s knowledge of the Japanese fresh produce market and on C-Two’s links to Japan’s processed food wholesale markets and distribution.

2006, 111 stores

2009, 125 stores

 

Malaysia

2001, Tesco entered a joint venture with Sime Darby Bhd; Tesco’s share was 70%.

12/2006, (Times 7/12/2006, p.61), Tesco acquired 8 Makro cash and Carry stores which it will convert, during 2007, into its Tesco Extra hypermarket format.  The average size of the Extra stores will be 100,000 square feet each.

2006, 13 stores

 

USA

2009, Tesco has 115 Fresh & Easy stores.  However Tesco’s entry into the USA coincided with the start of the Credit Crunch, the stores were yet to achieve maturity, and the distribution system was geared for a larger network than initially existed, to allow for future expansion.  Losses for Tesco’s USA operation were £142 million, 2008/9.  This followed a £67 million loss in 2007/8. 

 

By the end of 2009, there were 125 Fresh & Easy stores in southern California (Financial/Times 4 January 2010), rather short of the 500 originally planned for February 2010.  Expansion into northern California has been delayed.  Sales for the 1st half 2010 are projected to be around UK£ 160 million, whilst half-yearly losses are projected to stabilise at UK£ 80 million, for the Fresh & Easy venture; this has to be seen in the perspective of Tesco’s overall, profits of in excess of UK£1,500 million per half-year at this time.

 

There are (as yet) no plans for Tesco stores in Antarctica, Nauru, or the Vatican City.  Iraq, North Korea, the Gaza Strip, Greenland, Somalia, Turkmenistan, Iran, and Afghanistan are probably also off the list for now.

 

Tesco product diversification

 

1960 Tesco began selling non-food products.

1974, Tesco began selling petrol.

1993, Tesco launched ‘Gameshop’, selling Scottish wild venison.

1996 Tesco launched an Internet shopping service.  Tesco also launched ‘Personal Finance’.

7/1997 Tesco linked with the Royal Bank of Scotland to offer its own credit (Visa) card.

1999, Tesco began selling mobile phones.  It also announced plans to sell mopeds.

11/2000 Tesco linked with the Norwich Union to begin sales of life insurance in its stores.

7/2003. Tesco was considering selling legal services such as drawing up wills and handling compensation claims.  See 6/2007.

3/11/2004, Tesco began to sell mortgage products from its stores, under its ‘Tesco Personal Finance’ brand.

6/2007, Tesco announced it was to launch a property conveyancing service.  This would be a major challenge to many solicitors’ firms, for whom conveyancing is their bread and butter work – relatively easy work, but lucrative.  This follows the enactment of the Legal Services Bill, which received Royal Assent on 30 October 2007.  This Bill liberalised the legal services profession and would allow supermarkets to offer legal services to their customers.  The Legal Services Bill was soon dubbed the ‘Tesco Law’.

4/2010, Tesco announced plans to enter the property development market, building four new ‘villages’ in the south east of England.  Now you can live in a Tesco house, bought through Tesco’s conveyancing service, with money saved at Tesco’s Bank; stock it with Tesco electronic goods and Tesco furniture (yes they sell beds and wardrobes too), wear Tesco clothes, eat Tesco food, commute to a job at Tesco on a Tesco moped, fuelled by Tesco petrol, and if you fall ill, phone work on a Tesco mobile and then medicate with products from Tesco pharmacy, ordered online on Tesco’s Internet site.  Holidays? – visit a different Tesco village.  Education? - go to a school in the new Tesco villages.  Tesco only need to run a hospital and a cemetery and you could be born there and die there too.

 

Tesco store numbers

 

Year

Store numbers (UK)

Store numbers (non-UK)

Total store numbers

1939

100

 

 

1959

400

 

 

1972

790

 

 

1974

771

 

 

1979

571

 

 

1980

532

 

 

1983

369

 

 

1984

369

 

 

1987

377

 

 

1990

379

 

 

1994

416

103

519

1995

519

 

 

1996

545

 

 

1997

568

 

 

1998

618

 

 

1999

639

182

821

2000

659

186

845

2001

692

215

907

2002

730

221

951

2003

1,982

309

2,291

2004

1,877

441

2,318

2005

1,779 *

586

2,365

2006

1,897

775

2,672

2007

 

 

 

2008

 

 

 

2009

2,282

2,018

4,300

2010

2,482

 

 

 

1956, Tesco opened its first supermarket in a former cinema in Maldon, Essex.

1968 Tesco opened its first superstore, at Crawley, Sussex.

During the 1970s many small inner city stores were closed. They were too small to have adequate economies of scale and were in areas of low spending power.  Of the 518 Tesco stores of under 500 square metres sales area in 1972, just 190 remained by 1980. However improved computer and distribution technology means the smaller stores now operated by the main supermarket chains in the 21st century now can enjoy economies of scale similar to the larger superstores.

(A West, ‘Handbook of Retailing’, 1988, pp.39-40), (The Times, 10/2/2006, p.48)

* 2005, Tesco now has 100 Extra hypermarkets, 446 superstores, 160 Metro stores, 546 Express neighbourhood stores, and 527 T & S stores not bearing the Tesco fascia

Tesco Ireland is now the largest food retailer in Ireland, with 79 stores and employing 10,200 people.

 

Tesco CSR initiatives

 

1985, Tesco launched a ‘healthy eating’ initiative.

1988, Tesco began supporting a ‘Charity of the Year’.

1990, Tesco supported the environment by introducing ‘bags for life’.

1992 Tesco began its ‘Computers for Schools’ initiative. By 2004, a total of £77 million worth of computers had been supplied to some 24,000 schools participating in this scheme.

2001, Tesco established a Corporate Responsibility committee, and produced its first CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) report. Tesco began a mobile phone recycling scheme.

2002, Tesco CSR initiatives included a Christmas Card recycling scheme, inkjet cartridge recycling, and the introduction of a Group Human Rights Policy.

2004 Tesco began to supply biodegradable carrier bags, and trials in the use of solar energy for its stores.

 

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