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Tom Hunter
Sir Thomas Blane Hunter (born 6 May 1961) is a Scottish businessman, entrepreneur, and philanthropist. Sports Division Tom set up his first business after graduating from the University of Strathclyde as he was, in his own words, "unemployable". With a £5,000 loan from his grocer father Campbell and matching funds from a bank, he started selling trainers from the back of a van. Hunter built the business into Europe's largest independent retailer. In 1998 in an unsolicited offer, Dave Whelan's JJB Sports offered to buy the larger Sports Division for £290 million; Hunter accepted, earning himself £252 million. Other business activities Hunter had expanded Sports Division through financing supplied by the Royal Bank of Scotland, but when he proposed the takeover of Olympus Sports, RBS refused to finance the deal. Through his friend Sir David Murray, he met Halifax Bank of Scotland governor Gavin Masterton on a trip to watch Rangers F.C. play Juventus, and subseque ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
New Cumnock
New Cumnock is a town in East Ayrshire, Scotland. It expanded during the coal-mining era from the late 18th century, and mining remained its key industry until its pits were shut in the 1960s. The town is southeast of Cumnock, and east of Ayr. History Early history One of the first mentions of the village was when Patrick Dunbar of Comenagh signed the Ragman Roll of 1296. Blind Harry's poem ''The Wallace (poem), The Actes and Deidis of the Illustre and Vallyeant Campioun Schir William Wallace'' placed William Wallace in and around the village in his heroic tales of the patriot, calling it Cumno. In 1296, William Wallace and his men were forced to turn back from New Cumnock because the road at Corsencon had been destroyed. ''"At Corssencon the gait was spilt that tide"'' The main route from Nithsdale to Ayrshire passed by Corsencon hill in the east of the parish where since 1205 a toll and customs point had stood. Wallace's detour took him to Avondale (Strathhaven) where he ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Merlin Entertainments
Merlin Entertainments Limited is a British entertainment company based at Poole in Dorset, England. It was listed on the London Stock Exchange until November 2019, when it was acquired by a consortium that includes Kirkbi A/S (the investment arm of the Christiansen family, which controls The Lego Group). History In December 1998, Nick Varney, Andrew Carr and the senior management team of Vardon Attractions (Vardon plc) completed a management buyout of the company to form Merlin Entertainments Group Ltd., with the backing of the private equity firm Apax Partners. Apax sold the company in 2004 to another financial investor, Hermes Private Equity. In May 2005, the company was acquired from Hermes by a division of The Blackstone Group, which later started a major expansion. Over the years, Merlin acquired Gardaland, an Italian theme park, and The Tussauds Group. The company was first listed on the London Stock Exchange in 2013. Legoland When the Legoland theme park was up for ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Monaco
Monaco (; ), officially the Principality of Monaco (french: Principauté de Monaco; Ligurian: ; oc, Principat de Mónegue), is a sovereign city-state and microstate on the French Riviera a few kilometres west of the Italian region of Liguria, in Western Europe, on the Mediterranean Sea. It is bordered by France to the north, east and west. The principality is home to 38,682 residents, of whom 9,486 are Monégasque nationals; it is widely recognised as one of the most expensive and wealthiest places in the world. The official language of the principality is French. In addition, Monégasque (a dialect of Ligurian), Italian and English are spoken and understood by many residents. With an area of , it is the second-smallest sovereign state in the world, after Vatican City. Its make it the most densely-populated sovereign state in the world. Monaco has a land border of and the world's shortest coastline of approximately ; it has a width that varies between . The hig ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
London Stock Exchange
London Stock Exchange (LSE) is a stock exchange in the City of London, England, United Kingdom. , the total market value of all companies trading on LSE was £3.9 trillion. Its current premises are situated in Paternoster Square close to St Paul's Cathedral in the City of London. Since 2007, it has been part of the London Stock Exchange Group (LSEG, that it also lists ()). The LSE was the most-valued stock exchange in Europe from 2003 when records began till Autumn 2022, when the Paris exchange was briefly larger, until the LSE retook its position as Europe’s largest stock exchange 10 days later. History Coffee House The Royal Exchange had been founded by English financier Thomas Gresham and Sir Richard Clough on the model of the Antwerp Bourse. It was opened by Elizabeth I of England in 1571. During the 17th century, stockbrokers were not allowed in the Royal Exchange due to their rude manners. They had to operate from other establishments in the vicinity, notably Jona ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tesco
Tesco plc () is a British multinational groceries and general merchandise retailer headquartered in Welwyn Garden City, England. 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 (where it has a market share of around 28.4%). Tesco has expanded globally since the early 1990s, with operations in 11 other countries in the world. The company pulled out of the US in 2013, but continues to see growth elsewhere. Since the 1960s, Tesco has diversified into areas such as the retailing of books, clothing, electronics, furniture, toys, petrol, software, financial services, telecoms and internet services. In the 1990s, Tesco re-positioned itself from being a downmarket high-volume low-cost retailer, attempting to attract a range of social groups with its low-cost ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Dobbies Garden Centres
Dobbies Garden Centres (styled as Dobbies) is a British chain of garden centres based in Lasswade, Scotland. It is the biggest garden centre operator in the United Kingdom, operating over 75 stores, some of which it acquired from the previous biggest garden centre chain, Wyevale. History The business was founded in 1865 by James Dobbie, who created a seeds business named Dobbie & Co. in Renfrew, Scotland. After being awarded the Royal Warrant for Gardeners and Nurserymen to the Royal Household, the company expanded into a seed catalogue business, where it built up a customer base of 50,000 over the following century. In 1969 the company expanded out of its Scottish base into England, and was floated on AIM in 1987. Up until 1984 Dobbies continued to operate principally as a seed merchant. It was then bought out by David Barnes, managing director of Waterers. Between 1984 and 1989 Dobbies opened five new garden centres in Scotland. The company was floated on the Stock Exch ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Financial Crisis Of 2007–2008
Finance is the study and discipline of money, currency and capital assets. It is related to, but not synonymous with economics, the study of production, distribution, and consumption of money, assets, goods and services (the discipline of financial economics bridges the two). Finance activities take place in financial systems at various scopes, thus the field can be roughly divided into personal, corporate, and public finance. In a financial system, assets are bought, sold, or traded as financial instruments, such as currencies, loans, bonds, shares, stocks, options, futures, etc. Assets can also be banked, invested, and insured to maximize value and minimize loss. In practice, risks are always present in any financial action and entities. A broad range of subfields within finance exist due to its wide scope. Asset, money, risk and investment management aim to maximize value and minimize volatility. Financial analysis is viability, stability, and profitability a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Galen Weston
Willard Gordon Galen Weston (October 29, 1940April 12, 2021) was a British-Canadian billionaire businessman and Chairman Emeritus of George Weston Limited, a Canadian food processing and distribution company. Weston and his family, with an estimated net worth of US$8.7 billion, are listed as the third wealthiest in Canada and 178th in the world by ''Forbes'' magazine (June 2019). In addition to being one of the country's leading bakers through wholly owned subsidiary Weston Foods, he was an experienced supermarket retailer who maintained a controlling interest in Loblaw Companies, Canada's largest food retailer, through a family holding company. Weston was also head of the world's second-largest luxury goods retailer as chairman of Holt Renfrew in Canada and the Selfridges Group, owner of Selfridges in the United Kingdom, Brown Thomas in Ireland, the De Bijenkorf department store chain in the Netherlands, and the recently acquired Ogilvy department store in Montreal. Westo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Selfridges
Selfridges, also known as Selfridges & Co., is a chain of high-end department stores in the United Kingdom that is operated by Selfridges Retail Limited, part of the Selfridges Group of department stores. It was founded by Harry Gordon Selfridge in 1908. The historic Daniel Burnham-designed flagship store on London's Oxford Street is the second-largest shop in the UK (after Harrods) and opened on 15 March 1909. Other Selfridges stores opened in the Trafford Centre (1998) and Exchange Square (2002) in Manchester, and in the Bullring in Birmingham (2003). In the 1940s, smaller provincial Selfridges stores were sold to the John Lewis Partnership, and in 1951, the original Oxford Street store was acquired by the Liverpool-based Lewis's chain of department stores. Lewis's and Selfridges were then taken over in 1965 by the Sears Group, owned by Charles Clore.subscription required Expanded under the Sears Group to include branches in Manchester and Birmingham, the chain was acquir ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Wyevale Garden Centres
Wyevale Garden Centres (formerly The Garden Centre Group) was a British chain of garden centres. At its height, it was the largest garden centre operator in the United Kingdom, with 154 locations in England and Wales. It became the largest garden centre group by acquiring the Blooms of Bressingham chain in February 2007, and traded under both the Wyevale and Blooms names. It had acquired many smaller garden centre locations during its time, which also helped to allow it to reach its peak. Following financial difficulties, Dobbies Garden Centres became the largest national garden centre operator in the country by purchasing the vast majority of Wyevale and Blooms locations in 2018. Any remaining locations were sold to independent owners and smaller chains, with the final outlets sold and converted to British Garden Centres in 2019. As of late 2020, Wyevale is currently going through the final legal stages of liquidation with Deloitte. History The company started as a mail-orde ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
British Home Stores
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. The company was founded in 1928 by a group of U.S. entrepreneurs, and had a total of 163 stores mainly located in high streets or shopping centres by the time of its closure in 2016, as well as 74 international stores across 18 separate territories. BHS was previously a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index, but was bought by Sir Philip Green in 2000 and taken private. The company became part of Green's Arcadia Group in 2009. Following a number of loss-making years, the company was sold to the consortium Retail Acquisitions Ltd led by the serial bankrupt Dominic Chappell, in March 2015 for the nominal price of £1. In April 2016, 13 months after the purchase by Ret ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
USC (store)
USC is a clothing retailer that sells branded clothing across the United Kingdom and Ireland. The company was founded in 1989 in Edinburgh and has been owned by the Frasers Group since 2011. History The first USC store opened in 1989 in Edinburgh and specialised in sports clothing. USC originally stood for 'United Sports Corporation' and was founded by Angus Morrison and David Douglas. USC was purchased for £43 million by Sir Tom Hunter in 2004. The company entered into administration on 29 December 2008, and 15 stores were closed. The remaining 43 stores were bought in a pre-packaged deal by Dundonald Holdings Ltd, also owned by Sir Tom Hunter. In July 2011, Tom Hunter sold 80% of USC to Mike Ashley's Sports Direct chain. In early 2012, Sports Direct bought the remaining 20% and now fully owns the business. USC's Head Office was moved to Shirebrook to merge in with its Sports Direct Head Office. Sports Direct purchased Republic out of administration in 2013 and merged the bu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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