Rising to the Challenge!
Following the 2009 floods in Workington and Cockermouth when the River Derwent burst its banks, many local bridges were damaged or washed away. Workington residents found their town split in two with the main town bridge down. The south bank had a Tesco store, but locals on the north bank had a miserable half an hour detour to their nearest shop and three hour drive to a supermarket.
The nation pulled together to try and return a sense of normality for the locals, the army built a footbridge and Network Rail constructed a new station. Tesco also wanted to help and set out to create a new temporary store on the north bank.
A close knit team was quickly pulled together, including Yorkon, Johnson Construction and Smith Smalley Architects providing design services. The team's rapid response ensured this provisional supermarket was an outstanding success; open and trading just 13 days after the floods hit the community.
At the recent Retail Industry Awards 2010, efforts on Workington's temporary store, won Tesco the ‘Community Retailer of the Year' award.
Hugh Garavelli of Tesco announced "our teams worked night and day to provide a temporary store to support the local community, managing to do so in a phenomenal 13 days".
