Food World branches into wholesale

Customers pay for goods during the official opening of the country’s first indigenous-owned wholesale, the Trade Centre, on Friday last week

Business Reporter
Local consumer goods group Food World has branched into the wholesale business after opening the country’s first wholly indigenous wholesale — Trade Centre.
The branch was officially opened last week and management at Food World said they were motivated to venture in wholesale by Government’s calls for indigenous people to stand up and contribute to their own economic destiny. Trade Centre chief executive Mr Farai Chisvo said their thrust was to offer excellent service while giving value for money to customers.

“Our focus is to fulfil Government’s call
by making sure that we take full control of our economic destiny and determine our own future while running away from the dependency syndrome on foreign donors. We want to serve our customers so that they can save their hard-earned money regardless of their class in

society while extending a world-class brand and service and offering the best value to our customers,” he said.
The megastore project, which took about 10 months to complete, occupies a space of 5 000 square metres and is stocked with a wide range of products that include food- stuffs, home appliances, electronic gadgets and plasticware are available.

Mr Chisvo added that Food World had a vision to expand its branch network as it seeks to cement its brand’s presence on the local scene while looking to spread their wings regionally. The Trade Centre boss also said they have a dedicated sales team that deals with all their account holders, which makes it possible to give the best service that is tailor-made for every account holder’s needs.

Mr Chisvo added that the location of their first wholesale branch is also very strategic as it is on the outskirts of the central business district thus affording lots of parking space.

Mr Chisvo added that it has been a very long journey since establishment of the family business in Chitungwiza in 1985 as a small tuckshop. The business then developed to two supermarkets in the same town before joining the Spar franchise to become known as Food World Spar.

In 2001, Food World left the Spar franchise to stand as an independent brand which saw the fledgling supermarket operating branches in Harare’s CBD and Chitungwiza.

Mr Chisvo said: “The option to take up the Trade Centre premises came up last year in November. It was a dream come true for a vision we had cherished for so long, and that is to establish a megastore that is a one-stop-shop for customers.”