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Forte Group
Forte Group plc was a British hotel and restaurant company. It was listed on the London Stock Exchange and was a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index until it was acquired by Granada in 1996. Its head office was in the London Borough of Camden. History Charles Forte (26 November 1908 – 28 February 2007) was a British/Italian caterer and hotelier who founded the leisure and hotels conglomerate that ultimately became Forte Group. Charles Forte, funded by his two business partners, Eric Hartwell and Sidney Hartwell, set up his first "milk bar" on Regent Street in London in 1935 as ''Strand Milk Bar Ltd'' when he was 26. Soon he began expanding into catering and hotel businesses. After the Second World War, his company became Forte Holdings Ltd, and bought The Café Royal in 1954. Forte was a major caterer at the Festival of Britain sites in 1951 and also operated the restaurants and bars at London Airport, later known as London Heathrow airport. Forte opened the first full motor ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Public Company
A public company is a company whose ownership is organized via shares of stock which are intended to be freely traded on a stock exchange or in over-the-counter markets. A public (publicly traded) company can be listed on a stock exchange (listed company), which facilitates the trade of shares, or not (unlisted public company). In some jurisdictions, public companies over a certain size must be listed on an exchange. In most cases, public companies are ''private'' enterprises in the ''private'' sector, and "public" emphasizes their reporting and trading on the public markets. Public companies are formed within the legal systems of particular states, and therefore have associations and formal designations which are distinct and separate in the polity in which they reside. In the United States, for example, a public company is usually a type of corporation (though a corporation need not be a public company), in the United Kingdom it is usually a public limited company (plc), i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Heathrow Airport
Heathrow Airport (), called ''London Airport'' until 1966 and now known as London Heathrow , is a major international airport in London, England. It is the largest of the six international airports in the London airport system (the others being Gatwick, City, Luton, Stansted and Southend). The airport facility is owned and operated by Heathrow Airport Holdings. In 2021, it was the seventh-busiest airport in the world by international passenger traffic and eighth-busiest in Europe by total passenger traffic. Heathrow was founded as a small airfield in 1929 but was developed into a much larger airport after World War II. The airport lies west of Central London on a site that covers . It was gradually expanded over seventy-five years and now has two parallel east-west runways, four operational passengers terminals and one cargo terminal. The airport is the primary hub for both British Airways and Virgin Atlantic. Location Heathrow is west of central London. It is locate ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lillywhites
Lillywhites is a sports retailer based at Piccadilly Circus, London, United Kingdom. It is a division of Frasers Group. History In the 19th century, several members of the Lillywhite family were leading cricketers; another, Fred Lillywhite, organised the first overseas tour by an England team to North America in 1859. In 1866, the Lillywhite "No. 5" football was chosen for a London v. Sheffield challenge match organised by The Football Association; the same model in the early years of the FA Cup and was the ancestor of the International Football Association Board's modern ball specifications. In 1886, the Ivy League chose the Lillywhite "No. J" as the standard for American college footballs. The shop has been based at its current location of 25 Regent St. on Piccadilly Circus since 1925, catering to the London market with specialist departments for croquet and real tennis. In 1930, Messrs Lillywhite Ltd. supplied pilot Amy Johnson with her flying kit. Lillywhites' policy wa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Summerland Disaster
The Summerland disaster occurred when a fire spread through the Summerland leisure centre in Douglas on the Isle of Man on the night of 2 August 1973. Fifty people were killed and 80 seriously injured. The scale of the fire has been compared to those seen during the Blitz. Background Summerland was opened on 25 May 1971. It was a climate-controlled building covering on Douglas's waterfront, consisting of of floor area constructed at a cost of £2 million. The building's exterior and the interior were designed by two different architects—they did not coordinate their planning with each other and thereby created a venue with significant fire risks that were to become apparent only later. Summerland was designed to accommodate up to 10,000 tourists and consisted of a dance hall, five floors of holiday games, a rollerskating rink, restaurants and public bars. It was an example of Modernist architecture incorporating advanced controlled internal climate, built with novel const ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Harvester Restaurant
Harvester is a British casual dining restaurant chain with over 230 outlets (as of December 2015) in the United Kingdom. The first location was The George Inn, opening in 1983 in Morden, Greater London. The chain was seen before as a rival to Whitbread's Beefeater restaurants. Bass On 21 July 1995, Bass bought the seventy eight restaurants of Harvester for £165 million. Whitbread had offered £150 million for the chain. Most Harvesters were in the South East, and Bass had plans to rebrand other restaurants (such as the former Innkeeper's Fayre) elsewhere in England as Harvesters. When Bass divested its brewing division in 2000, the chain was looked after by the renamed company, Six Continents, until 2003. Mitchells & Butlers On 15 April 2003, the chain Six Continents was taken over by the renamed company, Mitchells & Butlers, and had 127 outlets. By 2012, there were over two hundred hotels across the United Kingdom. The brand grew far larger after the purchase of a large ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Crest Hotels
Crest Hotels Limited was a Bass-Charrington subsidiary operating the hotel interests of the brewery company in the United Kingdom. Crest's headquarters were in the former Hunt Edmunds brewery premises in Banbury, Oxfordshire. History In 1969 Bass transferred all its hotels, which had previously traded under the Bass, Mitchells and Butler's and Charrington's brands, into the Crest Hotels portfolio. Bass bought the European hotel interests of the Esso Petroleum Company in 1972. These were modern, purpose-built hotels located in the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Belgium, Italy, Germany and Austria. The deal involved 18 Esso Motor Hotels, of which ten in the United Kingdom, three were in the Netherlands, two in Belgium and three in Italy. There were also nine German hotels and one Austrian hotel which were leased from Esso. The hotels in UK were absorbed by Crest and the European hotels were supervised by a senior management team based in Germany Germany,, offic ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Travelodge UK
Travelodge Hotels Limited is a private company operating in the hotels and hospitality industry throughout the United Kingdom, Ireland and Spain. Known simply as ''Travelodge'', it is the UK's largest independent hotel brand with over 570 limited-service hotels across the UK. Company history Opening by Trusthouse Forte In the early 1970s, Charles Forte bought the US Travelodge brand with the hope of establishing it in Britain. The first Travelodges opened in 1973 in former Excelsior Motor Lodge branches, a brand of motels owned by Forte which were located near busy roads. Trusthouse Forte would later open another roadside hotel chain in 1976. These were ''Little Chef Lodges'' which were attached to Little Chef restaurants and was the first chain of budget hotels in the UK. In 1988, the two chains were combined and rebranded to become "Forte Travelodge". Granada ownership In 1995, Travelodge was bought by Granada, when the Forte Group (formerly Trusthouse Forte) underwent a h ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Little Chef
Little Chef was a chain of restaurants in the United Kingdom, founded in 1958 by entrepreneur Sam Alper, who was inspired by American diners. The chain was famous for the "Olympic Breakfast" – its version of a full English – as well as its "Early Starter" and "Jubilee Pancakes". The restaurants were mostly located on the roadside near A roads, often paired with a Travelodge motel, a Burger King and a petrol station. The chain was also located along motorways in Moto Services, for a time. The chain expanded rapidly throughout the 1970s, and its parent company would acquire the Happy Eater chain in the 1980s, its only major roadside competitor. When its owners converted all Happy Eater restaurants to Little Chef in the late 1990s, this allowed it to peak in scale with 439 restaurants. Little Chef began to face decline in the early 2000s, this mainly due to the chain expanding too fast, meaning it could not properly invest in all of its locations. Compared to its peak in th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Variety (magazine)
''Variety'' is an American media company owned by Penske Media Corporation. The company was founded by Sime Silverman in New York City in 1905 as a weekly newspaper reporting on theater and vaudeville. In 1933 it added ''Daily Variety'', based in Los Angeles, to cover the motion-picture industry. ''Variety.com'' features entertainment news, reviews, box office results, cover stories, videos, photo galleries and features, plus a credits database, production charts and calendar, with archive content dating back to 1905. History Foundation ''Variety'' has been published since December 16, 1905, when it was launched by Sime Silverman as a weekly periodical covering theater and vaudeville with its headquarters in New York City. Silverman had been fired by ''The Morning Telegraph'' in 1905 for panning an act which had taken out an advert for $50. As a result, he decided to start his own publication "that ouldnot be influenced by advertising." With a loan of $1,500 from his father- ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Quaglino's
Quaglino's is a restaurant in central London which was founded in 1929, closed in 1977, and revived in 1993. From the 1930s through the 1950s, it was popular among the British aristocracy, including the royal family, many of whom were regulars, and was a haunt of London's café society. It offered dinner, music and dancing. In the 1960s, it was sold to a succession of hotel companies, and its reputation faded; it closed in 1977. The name was revived for a new restaurant at the same location in 1993, "aiming to revive the spirit of the original". Origins Giovanni "John" and his brother Ernesto "Ernest" Quaglino were immigrants from Piedmont, Italy, probably from Riva presso Chieri or Refrancore, Asti. John was the ''maître d'hôtel'' at the Martinez Hotel in Cannes, and later worked at Savoy Hotel, The Savoy in London with Giovanni "John" Sovrani. Sovrani left The Savoy to start Sovrani's Restaurant in Jermyn Street in 1927, taking Quaglino with him; however, according to rum ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Grosvenor House Hotel
] JW Marriott Grosvenor House London, originally named the Grosvenor House Hotel, is a luxury hotel that opened in 1929 in the Mayfair area of London, England. The hotel is managed by JW Marriott Hotels, which is a brand of Marriott International, and it is owned by Katara Hospitality. History The Grosvenor House Hotel was built in the 1920s and opened in 1929 on the site of Grosvenor House, the former London residence of the Dukes of Westminster, whose family name is Grosvenor. The hotel owed its existence to Arthur Octavius Edwards, who conceived and built it, then presided over it as chairman for 10 years. A.H. Jones had worked for Edwards in Doncaster. In January 1929, six months after the completion of the first block of apartments, and six months before completion of the hotel, Edwards brought Jones to Grosvenor House as accountant. In 1936, at the age of 29, Jones became general manager of Grosvenor House. Apart from the war years, when he served with the Royal Artille ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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