Tesco sells site previously planned for new store in Manningtree to local company Rose
The Tesco site in Station Road on the Lawford/Manningtree border, at the time plans for a supermarket on the land were approved iin 2011. - Credit: Andrew Partridge
Supermarket giant Tesco has agreed the sale of land on which it had planned to build a new store in Manningtree to a neighbouring business.
Tesco announced in January last year that it would no longer be going ahead with the store, just a month before building work on the site off Station Road had been due to start.
And the retailer – which dropped a total of 49 proposed developments, including that in Manningtree, in the wake of poor national sales figures – announced today that it has now sold the site to local building company Rose.
Jessica Walker, local communications manager at Tesco, said: “Since announcing our decision to build fewer stores we have been working to find an alternative use for the site.
“We are pleased to have exchanged contracts for the sale of the site to Rose. We look forward to completing and seeing investment and development on this site,” she added.
The statement from Tesco quoted Steven Rose, managing director at Rose, as saying: “We are pleased to have reached an agreement with Tesco for their land and buildings adjacent to our current site.”
However, Mr Rose was not available to comment further yesterday on the company’s plans for the site.
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The announcement from Tesco last year also saw the cancellation of plans for two other new stores in north Essex, at the Martello Caravan Park in Walton-on-the-Naze and in Butt Road, Colchester.
However, the company – which also announced that it would be closing 43 existing stores in a bid to improve profitability – said that its plans for two other sites in Colchester, in Mersea Road and Prettygate, were unaffected.
Unlike the two other projects dropped in north Essex, the Manningtree store had already received planning permission although the scheme was the subject of considerable controversy.
The Rose building company was formed in 1995. However, the business is an evolution of the family firm of H L Rose & Sons which was established in around 1896 and has continued to trade through four generations of the family.
