 | This article needs additional citations for verification .(April 2010) |
 | |
| Company type | Private |
|---|---|
| Industry | Electrical Retailing |
| Founded | 1969 |
| Founder | Fred Dawes |
| Defunct | 1995 |
Rumbelows was an electrical and electronics retailer in the United Kingdom that once rivalled Currys, Dixons and Comet.
The company was established by Fred Dawes as a chain of television and radio rental shops in the 1950s, and named after him. The stores became more general electrical retailers. The chain was later acquired by Thorn Electrical Industries. In 1971 Thorn also acquired the Sidney Rumbelows chain, and Fred Dawes stores were subsequently renamed Rumbelows. Several other regional chains were bought around this time, including two chains in north west England, NEMS and Strothers, and J & F Stone in 1975 from Great Universal Stores. [1] As with Fred Dawes, these stores were renamed Rumbelows. Centralised control was established from the Nantwich, Cheshire, headquarters.
Several of the former Strothers and NEMS stores also sold records, musical instruments and hifi equipment. The Rumbelows store in Whitechapel, Liverpool had previously been the NEMS music store in the 1960s, when it was run by Brian Epstein, manager of the Beatles.
In 1989 the business was sold to Radio Rentals, which had merged with Thorn Electrical Industries the previous year. Thorn EMI (as Thorn Electrical Industries had become) transferred all of Rumbelows’ rental accounts to its Radio Rentals chain, bolstering its market position. With its core business removed, Rumbelows sought a new identity as a more conventional non-rental retailer, adding home computers to the product mix.
In 1992, Thorn converted some of the remaining Rumbelows shops into DER, Multibroadcast or Radio Rentals branches. [2] Some stores were also converted to the Fona brand, franchised from a Danish electrical retailer and marketed as "The electrical store from Denmark", with adverts starring Britt Ekland. [3] [4]
By the 1990s, the business was making losses and Thorn closed the remaining 285 Rumbelows shops and 36 Fona stores in 1995. [5] Rumbelows had been losing £12 million yearly, and had never made a profit in its 24 years of existence. [6] Some stores were sold to Escom, a German PC retail chain, but Escom itself folded in 1998. [7] In the 1980s, Martin Dawes (born c. 1945) carried on the family name in the electrical and electronic retailing sector, with his mobile phone business, which he then sold to Cellnet in March 1999 for £130 million. [8]
From 1990 to 1992, Rumbelows was the title sponsor of the English Football League Cup, an association football professional competition.
A grocery store (AE), grocery shop (BE) or simply grocery is a foodservice retail store that primarily retails a general range of food products, which may be fresh or packaged. In everyday U.S. usage, however, "grocery store" is a synonym for supermarket, and is not used to refer to other types of stores that sell groceries. In the UK, shops that sell food are distinguished as grocers or grocery shops
Rogers Plus was a brand name for the retail operations of Rogers Communications. It was formerly two separate brands, namely the Rogers Wireless chain of telecommunications stores previously operated by InterTAN under licence from Rogers, and the Rogers Video chain of video rental stores. In early 2007, Rogers retired the Rogers Video and Rogers Wireless brand names from its stores and re-branded them as Rogers Plus.
Hardware stores, sometimes known as DIY stores, sell household hardware for home improvement including: fasteners, building materials, hand tools, power tools, keys, locks, hinges, chains, plumbing supplies, electrical supplies, cleaning products, housewares, tools, utensils, paint, and lawn and garden products directly to consumers for use at home or for business. Many hardware stores have specialty departments unique to its region or its owner's interests. These departments include hunting and fishing supplies, plants and nursery products, marine and boating supplies, pet food and supplies, farm and ranch supplies including animal feed, swimming pool chemicals, homebrewing supplies and canning supplies. The five largest hardware retailers in the world are The Home Depot, Lowe's, Kingfisher of the United Kingdom, Obi of Germany, and Leroy Merlin of France.
Escom AG was a German computer company, best known in Germany, the Netherlands, United Kingdom and the United States as the successful purchaser of Commodore International and the Amiga trademarks in 1995.
British Home Stores, commonly abbreviated to BHS and latterly legally styled BHS Ltd, was a British department store chain, primarily selling clothing and household items. In its later years, the company began to expand into furniture, electronics, entertainment, convenience groceries and fragrance and beauty products.
HMV is a music and entertainment retailer, founded in the United Kingdom in 1921. In most of the world, the brand is owned by JD Sports and operated by Sunrise Records; apart from in Japan where it is owned and operated by Lawson.
GUS plc was a FTSE 100 retailing, manufacturing and financial conglomerate based in the United Kingdom. GUS was an abbreviation of Great Universal Stores, the company's name before 2001, while it was also known as the Glorious Gussies amongst stockbrokers. The company started out as Universal Stores, a mail order business created by the Rose family. In 1931, Isaac Wolfson joined the mail order company and would, through a series of takeovers, turn it into a retail, manufacturing and financial conglomerate, becoming Europe's biggest mail order firm and with over 2,700 physical stores. His son, Leonard Wolfson, followed him as chairman, to be succeeded by his nephews David Wolfson (1996–2000) and Victor Barnett (2000–2002). During the 1980s, the business divested much of its physical retail and manufacturing subsidiaries under Leonard Wolfson to concentrate on mail order, property and finance. In October 2006, the company was split into two separate companies: Experian which continues to exist, and Home Retail Group which was bought by Sainsbury's in 2016.
Thorn EMI was a major British company involved in consumer electronics, music, defence and retail. Created in October 1979, when Thorn Electrical Industries merged with EMI, it was listed on the London Stock Exchange and was once a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index. It demerged back to separate companies in 1996.
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.
Currys is a British electrical retailer and aftercare service provider operating in the United Kingdom and Ireland, specialising in white goods, consumer electronics, computers and mobile phones.
Thorn Electrical Industries Limited was a British electrical engineering company. It was listed on the London Stock Exchange, but merged with EMI Group to form Thorn EMI in 1979. It was de-merged in 1996 and became a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index, but was acquired by the Japanese Nomura Group only two years later. It is now owned by Terra Firma Capital Partners.
Our Price was a chain of record stores in the United Kingdom and Ireland from 1971 until 2004. Ourprice.com reopened online on 30 April 2024 with new owners.
Comet Electricals Limited, trading as Comet, is an online electrical retail chain based in the United Kingdom. The company sells consumer electronics and white goods, along with related products and services. Its predecessor, under the same brand name, pioneered the concept of the out-of-town discount warehouse in the United Kingdom.
Radio Rentals was founded in 1930 by Percy Perring-Thoms in Brighton, Sussex, UK, to rent out radio sets, with a turnover in the first year of £780. It later offered televisions and videorecorders for rent.
A catalog merchant is a form of retailing. The typical merchant sells a wide variety of household and personal products, with many emphasizing jewelry. Unlike a self-serve retail store, most of the items are not displayed; customers select the products from printed catalogs in the store and fill out an order form. The order is brought to the sales counter, where a clerk retrieves the items from the warehouse area to a payment and checkout station.
Hastings Entertainment was an American retail chain that sold books, movies, music, and video games and functioned as a video rental shop. As of 2016 it had 126 superstores, which were mainly located in the South Central United States, Rocky Mountain States, and in parts of the Great Plains and Midwestern states. Hastings Entertainment stores were also located in many college towns in the U.S. Hastings Entertainment was headquartered in Amarillo, Texas.
Poundworld was a chain of British value variety stores that sold most of its items for £1. It was founded in 1974 by Yorkshire-based father-and-son team Chris Edwards Sr. and Chris Edwards Jr. In contrast to many high street retailers, it maintained strong sales and growth during the global recession that started in 2007. Poundworld's product range consisted of over 6,000 items including groceries, health and beauty, toiletries, cleaning products and pet care, some of them known brands. At its peak it had 335 stores in England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. In 2014, it planned to open 150 new stores within three years.
Edison Brothers Stores, Inc., was a retail conglomerate based in St. Louis, Missouri. It operated numerous retail chains mainly located in shopping malls, mostly in the fields of shoes, clothing and entertainment, with Bakers Shoes as its flagship chain. The company was liquidated in 1999, though some of the chains it operated continued under different owners.
The retail format influences the consumer's store choice and addresses the consumer's expectations. At its most basic level, a retail format is a simple marketplace, that is; a location where goods and services are exchanged. In some parts of the world, the retail sector is still dominated by small family-run stores, but large retail chains are increasingly dominating the sector, because they can exert considerable buying power and pass on the savings in the form of lower prices. Many of these large retail chains also produce their own private labels which compete alongside manufacturer brands. Considerable consolidation of retail stores has changed the retail landscape, transferring power away from wholesalers and into the hands of the large retail chains.