Local knowledge ensures success overseas for Tesco

As Tesco’s stellar growth at home begins to slow, the retailer is increasingly looking outside Britain for growth and now has more selling space outside the UK than in it. International sales, at almost £10bn last year, are fast catching up with turnover in Britain.

According to Lisa Kavanagh, a press spokesman for Tesco, much of this success is attributed to the company’s approach to overseas expansion, where the retailer prides itself on adopting a ‘local hierarchy’, employing local people at all levels from the shop floor to regional management.

A large chunk of Tesco’s international expansion has been centred on Asia, where it has become a leading player in South Korea, China and Malaysia. Rivals Carrefour and Wal-Mart pulled out of their South Korean operations in 2006.

In a rare interview with the Telegraph, Philip Clarke, Tesco’s main board director in charge of the group’s international operations, commented on the group’s success in South Korea, stating that the company had “fought tooth and nail to look like a Korean retailer”.