Selfridges

Selfridges, also known as Selfridges & Co., is a chain of upscale 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 Selfridges flagship store at 400 Oxford Street in London is the second-largest shop in the UK (after Harrods) and opened on 15 March 1909. Other Selfridges stores opened in Stretford at the Trafford Centre (1998), in Manchester at the Exchange Square (2002), and in Birmingham at the Bullring (2003). During 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. Expanded under the Sears Group to include branches in Manchester and Birmingham, the chain was acquired in 2003 by Canada's Galen Weston for £598 million. In December 2021, the Weston family agreed to sell the majority of Selfridges Group for around £4 billion to a joint venture between Thai conglomerate Central Group and Austria's Signa Holding. The acquisition was completed on 23 August 2022.

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