Tesco was founded in 1919 by Jack Cohen as a group of market stalls.[9] The Tesco name first appeared in 1924, after Cohen purchased a shipment of tea from T. E. Stockwell and combined those initials with the first two letters of his surname,[10] and the first Tesco store opened in 1929 in Burnt Oak, Barnet. His business expanded rapidly, and by 1939 he had over 100 Tesco stores across the country.[11]