Kentish Express Ashford & District
Every little really does help
Tesco has four stores in Ashford.
The company has two Tesco Extra supermarkets: one at Crooksfoot in Willesborough and the other on the Park Farm estate. It also has two Tesco Express stores: one in Ashford High Street and the other in Mace Lane.
The company is the third largest retailer in the world measured by profits and second-largest retailer in the world measured by revenues.
It has stores in 12 countries across Asia and Europe and is the grocery market leader in the UK (with a market share of around 28.4%).
Tesco was founded in 1919 by Jack Cohen as a group of market stalls.
The Tesco name first appeared in 1924, after Cohen purchased a shipment of tea from T E Stockwell and combined those initials with the first two letters of his surname.
The first store opened in 1929 in Barnet, north London.
Jack Cohen’s legendary business motto was “pile it high and sell it cheap”.
His business expanded rapidly, and by 1939 he had more than 100 Tesco stores across the country.
Tesco repositioned itself in the 1990s, moving from being a down-market high-volume low-cost retailer to broaden its appeal, with products ranging from ‘Tesco Value’ items to the ‘Tesco Finest’ range.
This change of focus saw the chain grow from 500 stores in the mid-1990s to 2,500 stores 15 years later.