Carpetright is a British retailer founded in 1988 by Lord Philip Harris. Since July 2024, the retailer has been a division of Tapi Carpets which purchased the Carpetright brand, intellectual property, and some locations from administration proceedings for £3.7 million.

History

The company was established by Lord Philip Harris in 1988 when he opened its first shop in

Canning Town Canning Town is a town in the London Borough of Newham, East London, England, north of the Royal Victoria Dock. Its urbanisation was largely due to the creation of the dock. The area was part of the ancient parish and County Borough of West Ham, ...

.Carpetright History
It was first listed on the

London Stock Exchange The London Stock Exchange (LSE) is a stock exchange based in London, England. the total market value of all companies trading on the LSE stood at US$3.42 trillion. Its current premises are situated in Paternoster Square close to St Paul's Cath ...

in June 1993. In 1999, the company expanded through the acquisition of selected shops from Carpetland and

Allied Carpets Allied Carpets was a small retail chain specialising in floor coverings, mainly carpets (80%) and then also laminate and wood flooring and curtains, in the United Kingdom. Following financial difficulties and several changes of ownership, the c ...

. It acquired its first operations in

Continental Europe Continental Europe or mainland Europe is the contiguous mainland of Europe, excluding its surrounding islands. It can also be referred to ambiguously as the European continent, – which can conversely mean the whole of Europe – and, by som ...

in 2002, and in 2005 acquired May’s World of Carpets. In 2007, it added the Storey Carpets business, a firm based in

Sunderland Sunderland () is a port City status in the United Kingdom, city and metropolitan borough in Tyne and Wear, England. It is a port at the mouth of the River Wear on the North Sea, approximately south-east of Newcastle upon Tyne. It is the most p ...

, which had 54 stores at the time. Cascade Investment, LLC, the investment vehicle of

Bill Gates William Henry Gates III (born October 28, 1955) is an American businessman and philanthropist. A pioneer of the microcomputer revolution of the 1970s and 1980s, he co-founded the software company Microsoft in 1975 with his childhood friend ...

, acquired a 3% stake in the company in May 2008. Carpetright expanded again with the purchase of Sleepright UK in 2008. However, in June 2011 it announced significant shop closure plans and that year posted its first loss since 1993. It was reported on 21 March 2018 that Carpetright was struggling after issuing several profit warnings, and that it was looking at possible shop closures. On 12 April 2018, it was announced that Carpetright would close 92 stores, with a total loss of 300 jobs out of the total workforce of 2,700, as part of restructuring measures. In May 2018, Carpetright secured a £15 million

loan In finance, a loan is the tender of money by one party to another with an agreement to pay it back. The recipient, or borrower, incurs a debt and is usually required to pay interest for the use of the money. The document evidencing the deb ...

to provide short-term working capital. In November 2019, Carpetright announced that its largest shareholder, Meditor, had agreed to purchase the company. A bid of £15.2 million was accepted by the company, amid fears it could not pay off its debt. Carpetright have estimated that the company would need around £80 million to get out of its debt problems. The company’s gross debt was evaluated at £56 million. According to Carpetright, the rescue deal will help the company complete a turnaround plan in the “very challenging consumer market”. The hedge fund that will acquire the retailer is headed by Talal Shakerchi, the former professional poker player and the former fund manager for

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. Investec Asset Management backed the bid made by Meditor with more than 11.3 million shares. Carpetright announced the departure of chairman Bob Ivell in January 2020, as the store returned to private ownership after more than 26 years. Several non-executive directors stood down from the board because of the takeover.

Sale to Tapi Carpets

In July 2024, Carpetright announced it had put itself up for sale, appointing PwC to launch a formal sale process. The firm was purchased in the same month by Tapi Carpets, in a pre-packaged insolvency deal, a transaction that is often associated with the new company shedding its commitments to staff and creditors. As part of the acquisition, Tapi Carpets would acquire 54 stores, along with 300 jobs and 2 warehouses. The business outside the UK and Ireland (which would be kept by Nestware Holdings), 218 stores and the company's headquarters in Purfleet would not be part of the deal, affecting more than 1,000 jobs.

Operations

As of 2022, the company had more than 400 shops. It has expanded into

Belgium Belgium, officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Northwestern Europe. Situated in a coastal lowland region known as the Low Countries, it is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeas ...

, the

Netherlands , Terminology of the Low Countries, informally Holland, is a country in Northwestern Europe, with Caribbean Netherlands, overseas territories in the Caribbean. It is the largest of the four constituent countries of the Kingdom of the Nether ...

, and the

Republic of Ireland Ireland ( ), also known as the Republic of Ireland (), is a country in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe consisting of 26 of the 32 Counties of Ireland, counties of the island of Ireland, with a population of about 5.4 million. ...

. It sells a wide variety of beds, mattresses,

carpet A carpet is a textile floor covering typically consisting of an upper layer of Pile (textile), pile attached to a backing. The pile was traditionally made from wool, but since the 20th century synthetic fiber, synthetic fibres such as polyprop ...

laminate flooring Laminate flooring (also called floating wood tile in the United States) is a multi-layer synthetic flooring product fused together with a lamination process. Laminate flooring simulates wood (or sometimes stone) with a photographic appliqué la ...

vinyl Vinyl may refer to: Chemistry * Polyvinyl chloride (PVC), a particular vinyl polymer * Vinyl cation, a type of carbocation * Vinyl group, a broad class of organic molecules in chemistry * Vinyl polymer, a group of polymers derived from vinyl ...

flooring and rugs.

Marketing

It was announced in March 2020 that Carpetright would become the new main shirt sponsor for

Exeter City F.C. Exeter City Football Club is a professional association football club based in Exeter, Devon, England. The team play in , the third level of the English football league system. Known as "the Grecians", the origin of their nickname is subject to ...

from the start of the 2020/21 season.

References

External links

Consumer site
{{Authority control Carpet retailers of the United Kingdom Companies based in Essex Companies formerly listed on the London Stock Exchange Companies that have entered administration in the United Kingdom Retail companies established in 1988 Purfleet Retail companies of the United Kingdom 1988 establishments in the United Kingdom