Big W (United Kingdom)

Prior to the formation of Big W, Woolworths already had prior experience with operating large out-of-town stores. Under their former parent company, The F.W. Woolworth Company opened their first British Woolco store in Oadby, Leicestershire in 1967. The store was 63,000 square feet (5,900 m²) and offered many products like groceries, fashion and household products under one roof. By the 1970s, the company operated twelve stores under the brand. When the F.W. Woolworth Company spun off the British Woolworth chain into Woolworth Holdings PLC in 1983, the Woolco stores were converted to regular Woolworth stores, and eventually selling them off to supermarket chain Gateway in 1986, which then sold the stores to Asda in 1988. Only a few former Woolco stores remain to this day under Asda ownership.

In 1980, The F.W. Woolworth Company purchased the Southampton-based DIY chain B&Q, which at its peak had 26 stores. In 1982, Woolworth's operations in the United Kingdom underwent a management buyout from their former parent company, becoming Woolworth Holdings PLC. Under the new owners, the company went on to purchase electrical retailer Comet in 1984 and beauty retailer Superdrug in 1987. With the large amount of brands outside the now-named Woolworths brand, the company renamed itself to Kingfisher Group PLC in 1989.

As Kingfisher continued to expand, the company gained a hefty £100 million profit in 1997, and began the process of refurbishing Woolworths stores under three different subcategories - "City" stores, "Heartland" stores, and "Local" stores, which had proven to be very successful.[1] With the profit, Kingfisher began plans to take over the supermarket chain Asda with one of the plans if the purchase came into fruition was to create an out-of-town megastore chain that would bring the best of Kingfisher and Asda in one building, however at the last minute - Walmart instead took over the chain.[2]

However, despite the failed merger, the CEO of Kingfisher Group, Sir Geoffrey Mulcahy decided to go on his own, and publicly revealed the Big W brand in 1998, which brought the best of Kingfisher's retail chains under one roof. In the same year, the Canadian-born Bob Hetherington was chosen to run the chain. Bob had experience with the American F.W. Woolworth Company as he had previously run the American Woolco chain before all the stores were closed in 1982. Hetherington wanted the Big W stores to be fun places to shop in and to offer entertainment during the weekend.

A location in Edinburgh, Scotland was chosen to be the first Big W location. Construction started in September 1998, with the large 100,000-square-foot (9,300 m²) store opened in June 1999, proving to be a massive success for the Kingfisher Group as it attracted 30,000 shoppers in its first three days. The shop contained a Burger King fast food outlet and a Peacocks clothing concession in addition to the main range.[3]

Prior to this opening, Kingfisher announced on 30 April 1999 to purchase the Co-Op Homeworld retail chain, taking over 10 of the stores except for two of them.[4] While Kingfisher announced that most of them would be converted into B&Q Warehouse stores, others would be converted into Big W stores. In August 1999, they officially announced that the former 80,000-square-foot (7,400 m²) Co-Op Homeworld unit in Coventry would become the second Big W store, for an October opening date.[5] Plans were also made to convert the former Rotherham and Bristol Co-Op Homeworlds as Big W stores for Early 2000 openings, soon announced to be opening in March of that year.[6]

As stores continued to open, the chain expanded further. In July 2000, the Coventry store trialed a packaged food range through a deal with the Booker Group, and in September, signed a three-year deal with Peacocks to sell their clothes in all Big W stores. On 12 October 2000, Kingfisher announced plans to extend Big W's grocery lineup by 2001, while beginning their first television advertising campaign for the chain, titled "Moving Home".[7] At the same time, the next four stores in the chain, located in Stockton, Redruth, Bradford and Glasgow, would open between October and November. [8]

In 2000, Kingfisher Group PLC announced their plans to demerge their business, restructuring to focus exclusively on the DIY and Electrical markets. In 2001, the company spun off the General Merchandise division including Big W into a separate public company called Woolworths Group PLC, while Superdrug was later sold to Dutch company Kruidvat in the same year.

The demerger of Kingfisher heavily effected the Big W chain as a whole, as the purpose of the chain was now taunted by the loss of almost all of its major suppliers, essentially making Big W simply large Woolworths stores. With this, it was renamed Woolworths Big W. Despite this, stores continued to open up under the new name, with some existing stores having their logo on the top of the building changed to the modified version. In 2003, Woolworths started to open stores less frequently, as the chain was beginning to become very unprofitable for the company.

Following a period of losses, Woolworths confirmed in 2004 that it would abandon the Big W concept.[9][10] Woolworths announced that they would sell the stores that had planning permission to sell groceries, while the remaining stores would be downsized and become Woolworths Out-of-Town Stores. The first Big W stores to receive the downsize treatment were the Hartcliffe and Norwich branches. A store in Byker originally planned to open as a Big W also gained the format, except opening as a large Woolworths store.

On 9 January 2005, Woolworths sold the seven stores that sold groceries to Tesco and Asda,[11] which also included a Big W store in Grimsby that never opened. Within this time, all remaining Big W stores were converted into the Woolworths Out-of-Town formats, with the gross internal floor area of the remaining sites reduced to an optimum trading size of around 40,000 to 50,000 square feet (3,700 to 4,600 m²). Most stores continued to share space with Peacocks, while others were shrunk down in size entirely.[9]

Much like Woolco, Big W stores were found in retail parks or out-of-town areas around the UK and supplied goods from the four main Kingfisher brands. When the stores became Woolworths Big W, they supplied only Woolworths products. These remained mainly the same when the stores became regular Woolworths Stores. Some stores later introduced Woolworths Clearance Outlets at the back of the stores.