Tesco 2011 Annual Report Download - page 33

Europe
In Europe, general merchandise, clothing and electricals sales were
strong, reflecting an overall improving consumer background and
a strengthening offer in our stores.
Clothing in Central Europe had a successful year with a 9% year-on-
year growth in total sales. We are now the clothing market leader in the
Czech Republic, Hungary and Slovakia. Building on the success of the
F&F brand, we have introduced our F&F Blue and F&F Basics sub-brands
to provide our customers with a greater range to choose from. Our first
stand-alone F&F store also opened successfully in Prague last year,
highlighting the appeal of the brand in the Czech Republic.
In Central Europe, our trio of mid-market MY department stores
showcase our general merchandise, clothing and electricals ranges
including well-known brands such as Levis, FCUK and Disney. Our
flagship MY Narodni store in Prague and our stores located in Liberec
and Bratislava are traditional multi-floor department stores with open
layouts and a full range of product categories at multiple price points.
In the year, all stores made strong progress in like-for-like sales growth
with our brands such as F&F and Go Cook competing well against more
established luxury brands.
Our F&F clothing brand launched
in South Korea and Thailand this year
and the early response from customers
has been excellent.
SPORTS SHOPS
Our Sports Multishops in
South Korea have increased
sales of sporting goods in these
stores by over 60% with great
customer feedback.
Asia
We have seen strong general merchandise sales growth in our Asian
businesses – which are predominantly hypermarket operations. We saw
particularly pleasing increases in electrical products, with double-digit
growth in Thailand and over 30% in China.
Our F&F clothing brand launched in South Korea and Thailand this
year and the early response from customers has been excellent – a very
good example of the skill and scale of the Tesco Group being applied
across our global network.
Last year we opened our first three Sports Multishops in Homeplus
stores in South Korea. These innovative sports zones are designed to
meet growing customer needs for sporting goods, in a one-stop
shopping environment.
Sports Multishop presents our customers with a wide range of high-
quality branded sporting goods, a specialised bicycle shop, a golf shop
and over ten sports and outdoor brand shops, such as Nike and Adidas,
in a single 15,000 sq ft location.
Sports Multishop has increased sales of sporting goods in these
stores by over 60% with high customer penetration. We will open
Sports Multishop in ten more stores this year, with plans for further
roll-out thereafter.
GOING THE EXTRA MILE IN EUROPE
This year we began the remodelling
and conversion of some of our
older hypermarkets across Central
and Eastern Europe.
We’ve listened to our customers
and are making a number of
enhancements to our stores
to improve the shopping trip.
We’ve extended our range by
introducing over 5,000 products,
introduced product-specialist
employees to improve service,
and provided a better shopping
environment through the
introduction of conforming
layout, fixtures and fittings.
We’re also adding many of the
complementary services such
as Phone Shop, Opticians and
Pharmacy to provide our customers
with a wider range of general
merchandise products. We’ve
achieved very strong sales
improvements across the eight
Extras completed so far – with
an average uplift of 16%. These
refits are delivering particularly
marked uplifts in general
merchandise categories,
including clothing and electricals.
TESCO PLC Annual Report and Financial Statements 2011 — 29
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