30 May 2008

MEDIA RELEASE

The Warehouse’s entire stock of tents is headed to China to help earthquake victims

The Warehouse has pulled its entire range of tents off its shelves so they can be air freighted to China to help provide much needed shelter for victims of the recent devastating earthquake.

More than 1,200 tents have been removed from the shelves of Warehouse stores across New Zealand over the past week and transported back to the company’s central distribution hub in Auckland.

The action has been taken after the Chinese Embassy in New Zealand approached The Warehouse seeking to purchase as many tents as possible to aid China’s disaster response.

Chief Executive Ian Morrice says, “As soon as we received the request, we arranged for every tent on our stock list to be recalled to Auckland at our cost and offered the Chinese Embassy a substantial discount on the purchase. Obviously we do a lot of business in China – in fact all these tents were originally manufactured there – so it’s appropriate for us to do what we can to help in this situation.”

The Warehouse is now completely sold out of tents and is asking for its customers’ understanding until stock replenishment can be arranged.

The 1,200 tents weigh more than 14 tonnes and the shipment will include everything from small two-person tents right through to family-sized ‘pop-ups’ that can accommodate at least eight.

The tents are expected to be air freighted to China on Friday, alongside a range of other goods secured by the Chinese Embassy.

ENDS

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