15 years of service

TESCO arrived on Malaysian shores in 2002 with the opening of its very first outlet in Puchong. In the 15 years since, Tesco Malaysia has grown to 56 stores and two distribution centres nationwide with 7,616 colleagues that serve 4.5 million customers monthly.
Tesco has scored many firsts throughout its operations in Malaysia. It was the first hypermarket to introduce the largest price-cut campaign and was also the first hypermarket in Malaysia to introduce online grocery shopping and delivery in 2013.
AFFORDABLE QUALITY
The Tesco brand of products was eventually introduced to consumers as a cheaper alternative for better quality. The brand portfolio consists of Tesco Everyday Value, Tesco Standard, Tesco Finest, the well loved Tesco Loves Baby and the F&F clothing range.
“We have over 2,000 products, and more customers are turning to us because of quality and the price point. The great thing about our label is that 79%of the products are actually made in Malaysia. Some of these are made by the small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) that are building with us. All of these products are halal-certified so people can trust in the product that they see. We will continue to build that range over the next few years by going more on fresh food,” shared Tesco Malaysia chief executive officer Paul Ritchie.
COMMUNITY AT HEART
“We learn and grow together with the community that we serve. We are not just a hypermarket but we are also part of the community where we operate. We are responsible towards the people within our community and we know we could make a difference by engaging with them beyond our business operations. That’s why our community programmes have always been designed and developed to benefit the local community in many ways since 15 years ago,” said Ritchie.
Over the years, Tesco has partnered with many local nonprofit organisations to support various causes. Most notably, Tesco raised over RM1 million in funds for University Malaya Medical Centre to aid underprivileged children with leukemia.
Tesco’s latest endeavour tackles food waste. “One of the things we started on this year was food waste. We’ve all seen across the world there’s a big focus on food waste. As a food retailer, we should be looking at how we’re going to reduce the waste in our business to make sure that the maximum amount of food that is produced and sold actually goes to be eaten and not to be destroyed,” Ritchie explained.
“We’ve got a really strong partnership with Food Aid Foundation and Kechara Soup Kitchen. We started off with five stores in central Kuala Lumpur and we’ve now expanded to 24 stores. By mid of this year, we will be doing a food programme at every store across Malaysia.
“Since we’ve started, we’ve donated over 36,000 kg of edible food which was unsold, which is equivalent to 130,000 meals. It’s gone to over 100 charity homes in the Klang Valley area.”
A partnership with Pintar Foundation has also led to Tesco adopting 60 schools nationwide. The local Tesco stores near the schools interact with them to understand what their needs are, whether it may be maintenance or food. Tesco will also provide various educational programmes on topics such as food nutrition throughout the year.
Loyal customers can expect special promotions throughout the year as Tesco celebrates its 15th anniversary. To kick-off the celebrations, customers will enjoy RM15 off selected products, 15% off on selected Tesco brand products and 15% off on products from selected categories until April 2, 2017.