Central News Agency or Consolidated News Agencies, better known simply as CNA, is a South African retail chain of stationery and book stores.

History

Founded in 1896 to sell newspapers in Johannesburg by using newspaper delivery boys on foot and bicycles, CNA initially focused on selling ''

The Star ''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things already mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The'' is the m ...

'', '' The Standard'' and the ''

Diggers News The Diggers were a group of religious and political dissidents in England, associated with agrarian socialism. Gerrard Winstanley and William Everard, amongst many others, were known as True Levellers in 1649, in reference to their split from ...

'' newspapers. A breakthrough for the company came in 1902 when '' The Argus'' and the ''

Cape Times The ''Cape Times'' is an English-language morning newspaper owned by Independent News & Media SA and published in Cape Town, South Africa. the newspaper had a daily readership of 261 000 and a circulation of 34 523. By the fourth quarter of ...

'' newspapers granted a contract to the company to publish all of their newspapers. By 1904 the company had stores across South Africa and continued to expand to meet demand for news during

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll, one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, ...

. The company was floated on the

Johannesburg Stock Exchange JSE Limited (previously the JSE Securities Exchange and the Johannesburg Stock Exchange) is the largest stock exchange in Africa. It is located in Sandton, Johannesburg, South Africa, after it moved from downtown Johannesburg in 2000. In 2003 ...

in 1903 to raise £120,000 (equivalent to £129,500,000 in 2017 based on its economic share). By 1928 the company was publishing most of South Africa's newspapers. Shortly after World War II the company expanded by opening outlets in

Rhodesia Rhodesia (, ), officially from 1970 the Republic of Rhodesia, was an unrecognised state in Southern Africa from 1965 to 1979, equivalent in territory to modern Zimbabwe. Rhodesia was the ''de facto'' successor state to the British colony of S ...

(present day Zimbabwe). In 1983 CNA merged with Gallo Africa to form CNA Gallo. The company acquired South African cinema chain Nu Metro in 1990 and proceeded to fully buy it out in 1992. By 1995 the company had 350 stores across South Africa. The company was acquired by Wooltru in 1995 for R500 million. A difficult retail market for stationery and books in the mid to late 1990s and internal restructuring put the company under financial pressure. This led to it and its remaining 130 outlets being sold to

Edcon Edcon Limited was a retail company based in Johannesburg, South Africa. Its subsidiaries included Edgars, a department store with 203 branches. In 2020, the Competition Tribunal approved the sale of the Edgars division to Retailability (pty) ...

in 2002 for R130 million.

References

Bain Capital companies Companies based in Johannesburg Retail companies established in 1896 1896 establishments in the South African Republic {{SouthAfrica-company-stub