EXCLUSIVE Julian Hunt Tesco has confirmed every independent retailer's worst nightmare ­ it is planning to start trials of standalone Express c-stores. Thanks to its partnership with Esso, the multiple is on track to have 150 Express forecourt stores operating by the end of 2002 ­ and is opening one store a week to achieve that target. But Tesco chief executive Terry Leahy said the multiple now wanted to go a stage further. "Sales densities in these stores are among the highest in the group and we are now actively looking for standalone sites," he said. Tesco currently has 56 Express stores accounting for 121,000 sq ft, or just 0.7% of its total sales area. But if, as Leahy suggests, the format is performing better than the Tesco average ­ a weekly sales density of £22.01 per sq ft in the last financial year ­ independents would face a huge challenge from standalone Express c-stores. Leahy did not provide any targets for store openings, or timings, but said: "I think in this phase we will be reasonably cautious and open a clutch of standalone stores and see how they do." However, he made it clear Tesco was keen to "further accelerate" growth of the format and said it would prefer to develop newbuild stores "if we can get them". The Grocer reported back in October 1998 that Tesco was planning to develop a standalone c-store. This was denied at the time by Tesco. When asked this week why it had taken the multiple so long to move Express away from being a pure forecourt, Leahy quipped: "I'm sure when they invented the lightbulb the first question was Why did you take so long'?" He said small stores were only successful when all the constituent parts worked well together, so Tesco had taken its time and "refined, refined and refined" the format. {{NEWS }}

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