A CENTURY

One hundred years agoago, a 21-year-old from London’s East End took his demob money from serving during the First World War, purchased army surplus groceries and started selling them from a barrow in Hackney Market.

From small acorns, they say, mighty oaks grow.

And for Jack Cohen he can hardly have imagined that as his market stalls began to increase, his fledgling business would one day go on to become perhaps the most influential the UK has ever seen.

For when he started selling his first trademarked produce - tea shipped by a Mr TE Stockwell - he decided to merge the initials of his supplier with that of the first two letters of his surname. Tesco was born.

Taking the mantra ‘pile it high, sell it cheap’, it would transform the future of town centres across the county - as it did around the nation - and forever change our communities.

But many mourn the demise of the world before the big out-oftown supermarket superstores we’re now so used to.

“Do I think having these big stores where you can buy pretty much everything, is disruptive to our town centres and more importantly to our smaller shops in our local communities?” says Jo James, chief executive of the Kent Invicta Chamber of Commerce, which represents businesses, big and small, around the county. “The answer has to be yes.

“Tesco has only really been dominant for the last 30 years, but if you look in our local communities, rather than just the high street, prior to that, you’d

‘The most precious commodity most of us have now is time. We try to maximise that as much as we can’

bite into its profits. Its domination may, just may, be coming to an end. But not yet.

Ms James said: “We are about convenience now and we don’t seem to need or want the community aspect we had before.

“The most precious commodity most of us have now is time. We try to maximise that as much as we can.

“Tesco has been one step ahead and provided what we needed, before we knew we needed it. It has definitely shaped our landscape but would you say it was for the good?

“It’s totally changed the shape of communities and community stores because they can’t compete with these big conglomerates or the prices they can offer.”