Saturday, August 09, 2008
Leasing service for Tesco staff
Tesco is dipping its toe in the new car retail business with a leasing service for its employees.
Tesco Cars was launched as a pilot website last week and marks the latest stage of the supermarket giant’s handle on the services industry, where it already sells finance, insurance and warranty.
Tesco employees will be able to lease cars over a two to four year period, gaining 1,000 Tesco club card points for each year of the lease.
Cars, sourced from dealers across the UK, will be delivered to employees’ doors in the same way as Tesco delivers its groceries.
The leasing service is handled by Lombard Vehicle Management, which is part of the Royal Bank of Scotland Group.
A spokesman from Lombard Vehicle Management said: “It’s in its embryonic stage at the moment.
It will be piloted to a very select number of Tesco’s 300,000 UK employees before it goes live next year.
“Going live with the public market is not on the agenda at this stage.”
Tesco recently bought itself out of its personal finance joint venture with RBS for £950 million.
It revealed that it expects to make £1 billion from services this year, up from last year’s £400 million.
Sir Terry Leahy, Tesco chief executive, recently hinted at the retail giant’s future growth areas, saying: “Services are bigger and faster-growing markets than food.”
Tesco was looking at entering the online car retail market back in 2000, with plans at an advanced stage.
However, the idea was abandoned in the wake of the Block Exemption review in 2002.
DATED: 09.08.08
FEED: AM
Tesco Cars was launched as a pilot website last week and marks the latest stage of the supermarket giant’s handle on the services industry, where it already sells finance, insurance and warranty.
Tesco employees will be able to lease cars over a two to four year period, gaining 1,000 Tesco club card points for each year of the lease.
Cars, sourced from dealers across the UK, will be delivered to employees’ doors in the same way as Tesco delivers its groceries.
The leasing service is handled by Lombard Vehicle Management, which is part of the Royal Bank of Scotland Group.
A spokesman from Lombard Vehicle Management said: “It’s in its embryonic stage at the moment.
It will be piloted to a very select number of Tesco’s 300,000 UK employees before it goes live next year.
“Going live with the public market is not on the agenda at this stage.”
Tesco recently bought itself out of its personal finance joint venture with RBS for £950 million.
It revealed that it expects to make £1 billion from services this year, up from last year’s £400 million.
Sir Terry Leahy, Tesco chief executive, recently hinted at the retail giant’s future growth areas, saying: “Services are bigger and faster-growing markets than food.”
Tesco was looking at entering the online car retail market back in 2000, with plans at an advanced stage.
However, the idea was abandoned in the wake of the Block Exemption review in 2002.
DATED: 09.08.08
FEED: AM
