NewWorld Limited yesterday opened its 20th supermarket at its new location at Naiyaca subdivision in Labasa.

The $2 million supermarket investment project was opened by the Minister for Local Government, Urban Development, Housing and Environment Parveen Bala.

NewWorld general manager Peter Royce said this was the ideal location and the perfect time to open the supermarket.

“The reason we did the opening now because there was a great demand from our customers,” he said.

“Our customer base is very strong.

“We have the basic commodities at affordable prices and also a wide range of new products.

Mr Royce said they had currently 750 specials in store.

“We are refurbishing the second floor of the building as we have plans to sublet shops since we have more space,” he said.

“We had even approached banks to have an ATM machine.”

“We have got another major development opening in Suva but we delayed it.

“This because we wanted the opening in Labasa to be done first,” Mr Royce said.

Mr Bala, on behalf of the Government, thanked the directors and management of NewWorld for having faith and confidence in the local economy and investing in this project.

“I would like to congratulate them for this modern and high standard of environment in terms of shopping for the general public,” Mr Bala said.

“I have been told that they have been serving the public for the past 27 years.”

Goals

Mr Royce said their goal were to have a footprint in every major environment in Fiji and to provide the best level of service and ensure that their customers were happy.

“Our managers always talk to customers to find out what they want and they then make three to four trips to overseas like US, China, India and New Zealand,” he added.

“We are sourcing from every part of the world to give our customers exactly what they want.

“We have started branching out to South Africa to get a couple of things and give the customers some products.”

Future plans

NewWorld will be carrying out three major developments over the next three years.

“We are always looking for new sites and as for Labasa we are planning to open IGA at Damodar opposite our supermarket once that project will be completed,” Mr Royce said.

“We have some pending projects to look into.”

Also, we have some refresh scope of work for some stores over the next four years.

Currently, they have 1,500 employees and more people will be employed as their projects get completed.

EDITED BY: FARZANA NISHA

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