Bright and Hitchcocks (also known as Brights) was a

department store A department store is a retail establishment offering a wide range of consumer goods in different areas of the store, each area ("department") specializing in a product category. In modern major cities, the department store made a dramatic app ...

Geelong, Victoria Geelong ( ) (Wathawurrung: ''Djilang''/''Djalang'') is a port city in the southeastern Australian state of Victoria, located at the eastern end of Corio Bay (the smaller western portion of Port Phillip Bay) and the left bank of Barwon River, a ...

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

, operating on the same site from 1855 to 1979. The building remains today on the south-east corner of Moorabool and Little Malop Streets in central

Geelong Geelong ( ) (Wathawurrung: ''Djilang''/''Djalang'') is a port city in the southeastern Australian state of Victoria, located at the eastern end of Corio Bay (the smaller western portion of Port Phillip Bay) and the left bank of Barwon River, ...

Beginnings

The business had its origins in 1850, after three brothers, G.M., William and W.M. Hitchcock, emigrated from

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to Geelong with a cargo of merchandise and opened a store in Yarra Street. In 1853, William Bright, who had a shop in Moorabool Street, formed a partnership with G.M. and W.M. Hitchcock, and the new firm traded as Bright & Co. After Bright's retirement, the Hitchcock brothers continued to trade as Bright & Hitchcocks. By 1926, when the company was sold to five of its senior employees, it was the largest department store in provincial Victoria. The son of one of the founding brothers,

Howard Hitchcock Howard Hitchcock (31 March 1866 – 22 August 1932) was mayor of the City of Geelong in Victoria, Australia from 1917 to 1922, and a member of the Victorian Legislative Council for South Western Province from 1925 until 1931. He was also a phi ...

, was the last of the family to be involved with the store, retiring in 1927.

Changes

Bright and Hitchcocks became a public company in 1950 with almost 600 shareholders. In 1959, the company was purchased by Cox Brothers, which was a major Australian retailer, operating over 100 stores. Cox Brothers ran into financial problems and went into receivership in 1966. In March 1968, the store was sold to new owners, who changed the name to "Brights", the name by which the store had been known for many years previously. It was sold again, in January 1969, to Sydney-based Burns Philp and Co., who renamed the store "Mates", as part of the company's

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-based department store chain. The final sale was in 1976 when Chas Moore took over the lease, changing the name again, this time to "Moores".

Closure

Moores closed in 1979, and the building was divided into a number of smaller shops at the street level. The upper floors have since been empty, but the basement was occupied by a

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fabric store until 2005. The exterior of the building underwent a repaint and minor refurbishment in 2006. Part of the ground floor is now a

7-Eleven 7-Eleven, Inc., stylized as 7-ELEVE, is a multinational chain of retail convenience stores, headquartered in Dallas, Texas. The chain was founded in 1927 as an ice house storefront in Dallas. It was named Tote'm Stores between 1928 and 1946. A ...

convenience store A convenience store, convenience shop, corner store or corner shop is a small retail business that stocks a range of everyday items such as coffee, groceries, snack foods, confectionery, soft drinks, ice creams, tobacco products, lottery ticket ...

Images

Bright & Hitchcock's Store 1900

Beginnings

Changes

Closure

Images

References

Further reading