- Tesco Carlisle superstore closed due to flooding
- Supermarket builds 10,000 sqft replacement store in a week
CHESHUNT, England, 2015-12-23 — /EPR Retail News/ — Tesco has built a 10,000 sqft store in the space of one week to help customers affected by the floods in Cumbria. The store opens today and was constructed as a temporary replacement for its Carlisle superstore which was badly affected by the recent flooding.
Matt Davies, Tesco UK and ROI CEO said, “We’ve been helping communities across Cumbria following the recent floods and I’m proud of the huge effort made by our colleagues. We’ve been donating food, toiletries and essentials across Cumbria, from Carlisle to Kendal and every store in the region is acting as a drop off point for donations to the recovery effort.
“We wanted to make sure that people in Carlisle were not left without the service our store provides in the run up to Christmas and have worked extremely hard to get the temporary store up and running. As well as everyday essentials, the new store will stock a great range of festive favourites to ensure customers don’t miss out this Christmas.”
Tesco’s temporary store opens at midday on Friday 18 December with celebrations and a ribbon cutting ceremony. The store will be open 6am to midnight Monday to Saturday and 10am until 4pm on Sundays, with the existing store expected to open fully refurbished in late January 2016.
Tesco’s existing superstore, which has been serving the Carlisle community since 1994, flooded extensively during the recent extreme weather, with waist-high water affecting all of the internal space of the store. Colleagues were evacuated from the store as flood waters encroached upon the car park during Saturday night.
ENDS
Notes to editors
- The time-lapse video shows how teams of up to 100 people worked through the night between Friday 11th and Friday 18th December to deliver a new store for customers who were affected by the closure of Tesco’s superstore.
- We will be able to facilitate photo opportunities on the opening day and over the weekend. Please speak to Mark Thomas: 07889 591 304 / mark.j.thomas@uk.tesco.com if this is of interest.
- We will have a time-lapse video of the store build available following its completion. Please advise if you would like access to this, which will be made available.
- Over 30 colleagues were directly impacted by the floods themselves.
- Tesco has been responding to the crisis by donating food, emergency supplies, toiletries, sanitary products and water to shelters, refuge centres and churches across Cumbria. The Carlisle Victoria Viaduct Metro store is now a free water station, handing out free 5 litre bottles of clean water to those in need. Tesco has given food and supplies to emergency services personnel and their distribution network has donated 30 ‘cages’ of supplies to Carlisle’s independent food bank to support the recovery effort. Colleagues in Tesco’s Workington and Whitehaven have been distributing clothing and food door to door through local flood-hit communities. In Kendal, Tesco’s Express, which opened in late November, has been donating water, sandwiches, fruit and toiletries to the community.
- Tesco stores across the north of England, from Lincoln to Whitehaven, clubbed together to launch a major toy collection during Saturday 12th and Sunday 13th December so that children who had lost presents during the floods would not be left out this Christmas. Thousands of toys were collected and Eddie Stobarts came to the rescue to transport them all to their Carlisle depot, from where they will be donated to communities across Cumbria, including in Carlisle this weekend.
For more information please contact the Tesco Press Office on 01992 644645
We are a team of 480,000 in 11 markets dedicated to serving shoppers a little better every day.
Visit our Christmas 2015 news site at www.tescoplc.com/christmasnews
SOURCE: Tesco PLC
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