Tesco's giving record achieved despite recession

According to the Telegraph, CommunityMark company, Tesco, has broken its record for fundraising to support its charity of the year despite the economic downturn. 

Tom Hughes-Hallett, chief executive of Tesco’s charity of the year – Marie Curie Cancer Care – has stated that the vast majority of FTSE 350 companies now have a charity partner, and it is the depth and social reach of such arrangements that can bring most benefits to not-for-profit organisations.

Mr Hughes-Hallett is the chief executive of Marie Curie Cancer Care, whose partnership with Tesco last year broke the supermarket group's record for its chosen ‘charity of the year’, despite having to contend with a major economic downturn.

According to the Telegraph, Tesco raised a total of '£6.3m, which will help fund more than 315,000 hours of nursing care to more than 5,600 terminally ill patients and their families in their own homes - well exceeding a target of raising £2.5m to fund 125,000 additional hours of care.

Some £500,000 was raised through collections outside Tesco stores, with £2m coming from fund-raising efforts by shop staff, £500,000 from distribution centre employees and the remainder from head office operatives and merchandise initiatives.

The Tesco Charity Trust matched 20pc of the total raised by staff, helping Marie Curie achieve record revenues of £125m'.

Tesco achieved Business in the Community's national standard of community investment excellence - the CommunityMark - in 2008. The supermarket giant achieved the standard alongside 20 other companies, including Axis, Barclays, Blackburn Rovers Football Club, BT, Contract Scotland, Deloitte, Design Links, Elementus, GlaxoSmithKline, HBOS, Heart of Midlothian Football Club, KPMG, Marks and Spencer, PricewaterhouseCoopers, Rangers Football Club, RWE npower, Sainsbury's, The Town House Collection and Zurich.