Currys (branded as Currys PC World between the years 2010-2021) serves as an electronics retailer and service provider for aftercare that operates across The United Kingdom and Ireland, that specializes in consumer electronics, white goods computer systems, mobile phones and computers.
Currys was first established as a bike retailer beginning in 1927. Currys has expanded its range of products sold, and in the 1960s became a major retailer of electrical products for the home. In 1984 the company was acquired by a rival retailer Dixons and Dixons took over the company and the Currys brand was used across all retail outlets of the business. From 2008onwards, the company has moved away from shops located in town centres , and expanded to bigger out-of town stores with Currys PC World. Currys PC World label. This was done by consolidating the activities of Currys along with Dixon’s PC World under one structure. After the formation of Dixons Carphone in 2014, the stores were given Carphone Warehouse departments. The announcement was made in July 2021 that all Currys PC World outlets will be rebranded as Currys.
History
The beginning of the year
Henry Curry started to make bicycles in Leicester in 1884. Currys was incorporated as a business in 1927 when his four sons joined The Louth Bicycle Company, and the loose confederation of shops the sons were running since the time of their father’s retirement 1909, with the Nottingham-based Campion Cycle Company.
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By the 1940s, the shops offered a variety of products, such as bicycles, toys, radios and gramophones.
And, in particular, during the time of the directorship between 1967 between 1967 and 1984 under the direction of Dennis Curry, grandson of Henry Curry, the company saw significant growth and became a major supplier of white goods and televisions (refrigerators as well as washing machines and other appliances used in the household) In 1984, Currys Group plc had 570 stores, more than twice as many as the company which was then to acquire it.
In 1984, Currys was taken over by Dixons (another electrical retailer chain, which is now Currys Plc) but maintained its own brand name. Then, in April of 2006 Dixons Stores Group announced that its Dixons stores, with the exception of Ireland as well as in duty-free zones at airports they would be rebranded under the name Currys.digital (later it was changed back into Currys Digital). In Ireland, the Dixons stores in Ireland were replaced with Currys on August 8, 2008.
Before the Dixons brand change, the retailer was home to just a handful of small town centre shops compared with its larger number of mega stores located out-of-town. On January 17, 2007, the group’s chief executive John Clare announced that when leases on the remaining ‘Currys High St’ shops (not the revamped Currys.digital shops) expire in the near future, it is unlikely the leases would ever be renewed and consequently, the shops will be shut down at the first possibility.
Currys PC World
Dixons Retail began a trial of combining Currys along with PC World shops in 2008. In the Dixons Carphone Christmas 2015-2016 results update to shareholders, Sebastian James, group director of operations, said that for the next fiscal year, the “three-in-one” shop format (shops that carry Currys, PC World and Carphone Warehouse branding under one space) will be made available across the whole portfolio across The United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland.
Revival of Currys as sole brand
After reorganisations in both 2021 and 2020, Dixons Carphone announced that the Currys PC World stores would be rebranded as Currys by the end of October in 2021.