This is a list of the current and defunct discount chains of the United Kingdom. This list does not include discount supermarket chains which can be found at list of supermarket chains in the United Kingdom.
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This is a list of the current and defunct discount chains of the United Kingdom. This list does not include discount supermarket chains which can be found at list of supermarket chains in the United Kingdom.
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| Brand | Image | Founded / Came to UK | Owner | # of shops | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| B&M |  | 1978 | B&M European Value Retail S.A. | 800+ | The business was founded by Malcolm Billington as Billington & Mayman and the first store opened in Cleveleys, England, in 1978 and was acquired by Simon and Bobby Arora from Phildrew Investments in December 2004 |
| Bargain Buys |  | 2013 | Fortress Investment Group | 75 | Brand launched by Poundworld founder Chris Edwards to replace former DiscountUK brand, which closed with failure of parent company. Restarted as a sister brand by Poundstretcher. |
| Boyes |  | 1881 | Boyes family | 76 | Family owned discount shops department store chain based in Scarborough. Stores primarily in the North of England and East Midlands. |
| The Factory Shops | c.1980s | The Factory Shops Essex Ltd | 5 | Family run Essex-based discount shop [1] | |
| Home Bargains |  | 1976 | TJ Morris | 539 | |
| In-Excess UK | 4 | Discounter based in Hampshire and Dorset | |||
| The Original Factory Shop |  | 1969 | Duke Street Capital | 200- | [2] |
| OneBeyond |  | 2018 | Christopher Edwards Sr. | 54 | |
| Poundland |  | 1991 | Steinhoff | 450+ | Largest single price discounter in the UK |
| Poundstretcher |  | 1981 | Fortress Investment Group | 400 | |
| Proper Job | 1997 | Tilley Family | 10 | Father and son Ray and Peter Tilley started Tilley's Tools in Cornwall, before running it as a wholesale business from Weston Super Mare. Proper Job was started in 1997 is based in Somerset. [3] [4] | |
| QD stores |  | QD Commercial Group Holdings | 25 | Discount group based mainly in East of England & the Home Counties | |
| Savers Health & Beauty |  | 1988 | A.S. Watson Group | 410 | Discount branded health, home and beauty. |
| The Range |  | 1989 | Chris Dawson | 148 | Discount home and hardware originally called CDS Superstores |
| This Is It Famous Value Shops | 6 | Chain of discount shops located in Devon, Dorset and Somerset [5] | |||
| Tiger |  | 2005 | Zebra A/S | 46 | Danish discount shop based primarily in the South East |
| Trade Counters | c.1990s | 2 | South Essex based home and hardware discount shop with at one time five shops | ||
| Trago Mills | Early 1960s | 3 | South West based discount department stores | ||
| Value House Shops | 3 | South West based Home & Garden discounter, owned by the Ford Family of Ford & Lock / Brian Ford Discount Superstore fame. [6] | |||
| Yorkshire Trading Company |  | 1964 | Nichols Family | 35 (including 1 Goodwins branded store) |
| Discount shop | Image | Founded / Came to UK | Closed / Brand discontinued | Owned by | Number of shops | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 99p Stores |  | 2001 | 2016 | Lalani family | 259 | 99p Stores purchased by Poundland in 2015 rebranded as Poundland |
| Alworths |  | 2009 | 2011 | 18 | Rebranded from Woolworths, entered administration in 2011 | |
| Bargain Crazy | ||||||
| Barmy Bobs | Trading name of Yorkshire Trading Company that was phased out | |||||
| Basildon Stores | 2012 | 5 | Discount home, garden and hardware chain based in South Essex, closed due to retirement | |||
| Bewise | 2006 | Hamsard 2353 | 200 | Discount homeware and clothing retailer, went into administration 2006, some shops were purchased by new chain Store Twenty One [7] | ||
| The Big Label | 2009 | 5 | Formerly QS Discount, owned by QS Stores; owned five shops in Blackburn, Sale, Atherton, Warrington and Chorley | |||
| CDS Superstores | 1989 | Chris Dawson | Discount chain rebranded as The Range | |||
| DiscountUK | 2011 | 2013 | Chris Edwards and Chris Edwards Junior | 41 | Re-branded as Bargain Buys | |
| Family Bargains | 2010 | 2016 | Poundland | A sister brand of the 99p shop, which was rebranded as Poundland Plus after 99p Stores' purchase. | ||
| Glyn Webb | 2006 | 22 | Former discount DIY chain [8] | |||
| Grandfare | 1967 | Early discount store in Shiprow, Aberdeen, which became What Everyone Wants. [9] | ||||
| HEMA |  | 2014 | 2021 | Lion Capital LLP | 9 | London-centric Dutch discount shop that started in Amsterdam in 1926 [10] |
| House of Holland | c.1980s | South of England-based discount department store went into administration late 80s [11] | ||||
| Hypervalue | 1980 | 2009 | Hilco | Discount chain mainly located in South Wales, but had shops as afar as Southampton, bought by Hilco in 2006 before going into administration | ||
| ...instore |  | 2002 | 2007 | instore plc | ...instore was a new corporate name that failed for £-stretcher business – name reverted to Poundstretcher | |
| Max 99p | 2013 | 2018 | 4 | Family owned chain of discount shops located in Peterborough, Chelmsford, Pontypridd and Woolston. Went into liquidation in 2018. [12] | ||
| JC Nicholls | Trading name operated by the Yorkshire Trading Company that was phased out. | |||||
| One Up | 1993 | 16 | Clothing and Home discounter created by Storehouse plc, sold off in 1995 for £20m [13] [14] [15] | |||
| Parker Franks | Owned by Philip Green | Northwest-based discounter of homewares and clothing; changed its name to Xception [14] [16] | ||||
| Poundworld |  | 1974 | 2018 | TPG | >300 | Business started as market stall in Wakefield; branded Poundworld from 2004. Also traded as Poundworld Extra and Poundworld Plus |
| Quality Save | 1974 | 2024 | Richard Rudkin & Paul Rudkin | 21 | Business started as a market stall in Walkden, north-based discount chain. Taken over by Home Bargains and rebranded. | |
| QS Stores | 1932 | 2006 | Hamsard 2353 | 143 | QS started life as a clothing manufacturer. In 1960s they opened their first shop selling clothing rejected by main buyer Marks & Spencer. In 1980s the shop stopped selling seconds and went private in 1990. Was purchased by Hamsard 2353 in 2003 who brought it together with fellow purchase Bewise. Business went into administration in 2006. Some shops became part of Store Twenty One. [17] | |
| Shop Direct Group | 10 | Discounter of surplus stock from within the Shop Direct family of companies | ||||
| Store Twenty One |  | 2007 | 2017 | Grabal Alok | 200 | Discount clothing and homewares, created from the ashes of QS Stores and Bewise |
| Thing - Me - Bobs | 2022 | QD Commercial Group Holdings [18] | 11 | Stores purchased by QD in 2013. Moved to QD branding in 2022. [19] | ||
| Waremart | 2009 | Chain of discounters based in Yorkshire and northeast in former Woolworths shops | ||||
| What Everyone Wants | 1990 | 2003 | Tradegro | 130 | Formerly What Every Woman Wants, a Scottish chain of discount shops that became UK national in 1990 after its purchase by Brown & Jackson, owners of £-Stretcher. Sold to Tradegro in November 2002 before going into administration a month later. Locations were bought by Poundstretcher and Bewise | |
| Woolworths |  | 1909 | 2009 | Woolworths Group plc | 807 | Company went into administration, name lives on as a web-based retailer owned by Shop Direct Group |
| Xception | Philip Green | New name for northwest-based Parker Franks, a discounter selling a variety of clothes and homewares [14] [16] | ||||
| Your Home Stores | Greater Manchester based discounter of homewares [16] | |||||
| Your More Store | 1991 | 2004 | Tradegro | 199 | Set up Pepkor in 1991, the stores were based in Scotland and the North East of England. Bought by Brown & Jackson, owners of £-stretcher in 1997, before being sold to Tradegro in 2003 while in administration. [20] | |
Tesco plc is a British multinational groceries and general merchandise retailer headquartered in Welwyn Garden City, England. The company was founded by Jack Cohen in Hackney, London, in 1919. In 2011, it was the third-largest retailer in the world measured by gross revenues and the ninth-largest in the world measured by revenues. It has shops in Ireland, the United Kingdom, the Czech Republic, Hungary, and Slovakia. It is the market leader of groceries in the UK.
Safeway Limited is a British groceries brand, and former chain of supermarkets and convenience shops. The British Safeway was founded in 1962 by the American Safeway Inc., before being sold to Argyll Foods in 1987. It was later listed on the London Stock Exchange. It was purchased by Morrisons in March 2004. Most of its 479 shops were rebranded as Morrisons, with others being sold. Safeway-branded shops disappeared from the United Kingdom on 24 November 2005.
Wm Morrison Supermarkets Limited, trading as Morrisons, is the fifth largest supermarket chain in the United Kingdom. As of 2021, the company had 497 supermarkets across England, Wales and Scotland, and one in Gibraltar. The company is headquartered in Bradford, England.
Aldi is the common company brand name of two German multinational family-owned discount supermarket chains operating over 12,000 stores in 18 countries. The chain was founded by brothers Karl and Theo Albrecht in 1946, when they took over their mother's store in Essen. The business was split into two separate groups in 1960 that later became Aldi Nord, headquartered in Essen, and Aldi Süd, headquartered in neighbouring Mülheim.
Iceland Foods Limited, trading as Iceland, is a British supermarket chain headquartered in Deeside, Wales. It mainly sells frozen foods, including prepared meals and vegetables, alongside non-frozen grocery items such as produce, meat, dairy and dry goods. The company also operates a chain of shops called The Food Warehouse.
Acme Markets Inc. is a supermarket chain operating 161 stores throughout Connecticut, Delaware, Maryland, New Jersey, the Hudson Valley of New York, and Pennsylvania and, as of 1998, is a subsidiary of Albertsons, and part of its presence in the Northeast. It is headquartered in East Whiteland Township, Pennsylvania, near Malvern, a Philadelphia suburb.
Somerfield was a chain of small to medium-sized supermarkets operating in the United Kingdom. The business started life in the 19th century as grocers J. H. Mills, and after a series of buyouts and mergers, the company became known as Gateway. A major rebranding to the created Somerfield brand started in 1990, and in 1998 the company purchased the Kwik Save chain of discount food stores. The company was taken over by the Co-operative Group on 2 March 2009 in a £1.57 billion deal, creating the UK's fifth-largest food retailer. The Somerfield name was replaced by the Co-operative brand in a rolling programme of store conversions ending in summer 2011.
A big-box store, a hyperstore, a supercenter, a superstore, or a megastore is a physically large retail establishment, usually part of a chain of stores. The term sometimes also refers, by extension, to the company that operates the store. The term "big-box" references the typical appearance of buildings occupied by such stores.
Maxi is a discount grocery retailer based in Quebec, Canada. Founded in 1984 by Provigo, it is a division of Loblaw Companies and the largest of Loblaws' Quebec supermarket chains. Maxi is the Quebec equivalent of No Frills, a chain of franchised discount grocery stores outside Quebec, except that Maxi stores are owned by the company. Over 7,000 people are employed at the Maxi and Maxi & Cie stores across Quebec. Maxi's slogans are "Imbattable. Point final.", which references their price match guarantee, and "Maxi, ben oui, Maxi", the latter of which is often uttered by their spokesperson, comedian Martin Matte, in their television ads.maxi
FreshCo Ltd. is a Canadian chain of discount supermarkets owned by Sobeys. It was launched in March 2010. As of September 2024, there were over 125 FreshCo stores.
Poundland Limited is a British variety store chain founded in 1990. It once sold most items at the single price of £1, including clearance items and proprietary brands. The first pilot store opened in December 1990 following numerous rejections by landlords who had reservations about allowing a single-price store to operate, fearing it could adversely affect the local competition. An estimated 7 million customers shopped in Poundland every week in 2016, many being female shoppers in the C1, C2, D and E categories. Following a drop in share price of over 50%, Poundland was acquired in August 2016 by Steinhoff International for £610 million.
Lidl is a German international discount retailer chain that operates over 12,000 stores, present in every member state of the European Union, Serbia, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and the United States. Headquartered in Neckarsulm, Baden-Württemberg, the company belongs to the Schwarz Group, which also includes hypermarket chain Kaufland.
Poundworld was a British variety retailer. It was founded in 1974 as Bargain Centre by Yorkshire-based father-and-son team Chris Edwards Sr. and Chris Edwards Jr. The business then became a single-price retailer in 1997 as Everything £1, before renaming to Poundworld in 2003.
Netto was a discount supermarket chain in the United Kingdom. Netto arrived in the United Kingdom in December 1990, as part of an internationalisation process by its Danish owner, Salling Group. By May 2010, it operated 193 stores, before it was sold to Asda. In June 2014, Salling Group returned Netto to the United Kingdom, as a 50:50 joint venture with Sainsbury's.
QD Stores Limited is a British independently-owned discount retailer operating in the United Kingdom, primarily in East Anglia and the East Midlands regions. Products stocked include a mixture of items for the home and garden, basic groceries and a range of clothing and footwear. The company also run Cherry Lane Garden Centres.
Pep&Co was a British discount fashion retail chain, owned by the South African company Pepkor and based in Watford, England.
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| Regional | |
