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Conrad Mwanawashe  Business Reporter
TM Supermarkets has spent close to $4,5 million towards refurbishment and stocking of its new state of the art supermarket at the Old Mutual’s Msasa premises. The shopping complex, which was previously used by Jaggers Msasa, will be opened on Thursday. Of the $4,5 million, $3 million went towards building refurbishments, new equipment which include about 20 Point of Sale machines, refrigerators, bakery equipment, an up market butchery and air conditioning system. The balance will go towards stocking for the new supermarket.
The funds were raised by both TM Supermarkets and Old Mutual.

Tanganda Tea Company, another Meikles Group associate company has also taken up space at the plus 25000 square metres shopping complex.
There are two distribution centres one for TM and another for Tanganda. The distribution centres take up about 8000 square metres while the trading area for the new supermarket takes up about 5000 square meters.

There is also a wholesale area at the complex.
The other area has been taken up by Union Hardware who will provide hardware solutions.

Meikles Group finance director who is also acting TM Supermarkets chief executive officer Mr Onias Makamba told The Herald Business in an interview that the supermarket is expected to contribute positively to the chain’s performance due to its location.

“We are optimistic about the future,” said Mr Makamba.
“Old Mutual as our landlord have assisted us with part of the $3 million which went towards renovations,” he said.

He said more than 180 new staff members were recruited and trained for the Thursday official opening.
TM Supermarkets is also renovating Bulawayo Hyper and is opening a Pick & Pay supermarket in Gweru among many other refurbishment exercises currently going on.

The supermarket chain is one of the leading food and grocery retail brand in Zimbabwe and currently comprises of a branch network of about 53 stores country wide whose store formats range from convenient small supermarkets to hypermarkets.

The increase of supermarkets from 49 in March last year to 53 had increased trading space 10 percent to 55,000m².
The business also has Pick n Pay of South Africa as a shareholder with a 49 percent stake in a relationship that encompasses the sharing of technical expertise and sourcing of the much needed product brands from South Africa to compliment the Zimbabwean range in an effort to meet and exceed customer expectations.