Jewson is one of the largest chains of British general builders' merchants, selling to small and medium

building contractor A contractor (North American English) or builder (British English), is responsible for the day-to-day oversight of a construction site, management of vendors and trades, and the communication of information to all involved parties throughout the c ...

s. The chain comprises around 500 branches located all across Great Britain. Jewson is part of Denmark's

STARK Group STARK Group is one of the largest retailers and distributors of building materials for the professional segment in Europe with approx. 19,000 employees and 1,100 branches and distribution centres. Headquartered at Frederiksberg, Denmark, STARK Gr ...

History

George Jewson bought a business in

Earith Earith is a village and civil parish in Cambridgeshire, England. Lying approximately east of Huntingdon, Earith is situated within Huntingdonshire which is a non-metropolitan district of Cambridgeshire as well as being a historic county of E ...

in 1836 to trade goods in the

Huntingdonshire Huntingdonshire (; abbreviated Hunts) is a local government district in Cambridgeshire, England, which was historically a county in its own right. It borders Peterborough to the north, Fenland to the north-east, East Cambridgeshire to the e ...

Fens of

East Anglia East Anglia is an area of the East of England, often defined as including the counties of Norfolk, Suffolk and Cambridgeshire, with parts of Essex sometimes also included. The name derives from the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of the East Angles, ...

. His son John Wilson Jewson (b. 1817) had 13 children: the eldest, George, at the time working with a timber merchant in

Norwich Norwich () is a cathedral city and district of the county of Norfolk, England, of which it is the county town. It lies by the River Wensum, about north-east of London, north of Ipswich and east of Peterborough. The population of the Norwich ...

, suggested expansion there. John Jewson bought a house in Colegate in Norwich in 1868, and he moved there where he developed a successful timber, coal and builders' merchant business. The family played a role in civic service in Norwich and Norfolk. Jewson, as part of the Meyer group, was acquired by the French conglomerate

Saint-Gobain Compagnie de Saint-Gobain S.A. () is a French multinational corporation, founded in 1665 in Paris as the Manufacture royale de glaces de miroirs, and today headquartered on the outskirts of Paris, at La Défense and in Courbevoie. Originally a ...

in April 2000. In October 2001, Worldwide Business Information and Market Reports stated that "Having undergone a period of major consolidation, the builders' merchants market is now dominated by Jewson Ltd (owned by Saint-Gobain Building Distribution Ltd), Wolseley and

Travis Perkins Travis Perkins plc is a British builders' merchant and home improvement retailer with head offices based in Northampton. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange, and is a constituent of the FTSE 250 Index. Through its Toolstation subsidiary, ...

... These top three companies each have total sales of over £1bn." In December 2022, Saint-Gobain announced it was selling Jewson to Denmark's STARK Group for £740m. The sale included Gibbs & Dandy, the Northern Ireland based brand JP Corry, specialist brands Jewson Civil Frazer and Minster, and International Timber. The sale was completed in early 2023, when STARK appointed former Travis Perkins executive John Carter as CEO of the newly-formed Stark Building Materials UK Ltd.

Litigation

On 15 May 2009, Jewson Ltd applied under s.69 (1)

Companies Act 2006 The Companies Act 2006 (c. 46) is an act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom which forms the primary source of UK company law. The act was brought into force in stages, with the final provision being commenced on 1 October 2009. It largel ...

for a change of name of Jewson's Drives Ltd which had been registered since 18 March 2009. Jewson Ltd argued that they enjoyed goodwill under the name "Jewson" since 1836 and that they were the United Kingdom's leading timber and builders' merchant. Jewson Ltd alleged that Jewson's Drives Ltd had been offering flagging, paving, fencing and related services and that their own customers had been misled by the respondent. However, as long as Jewson's Drives Ltd had actually been operating as a business and there was no evidence to show they only registered their name for the purpose of obtaining (valuable) consideration from Jewson Ltd or for the sake of obstructing their own registration of a name, then they could have a defence to the application. Jewson Ltd's application was struck out by the adjudicator.Jewson Ltd -v- Jewson's Drives Ltd
Retrieved 21 September 2014

References

External links

* {{Use British English, date=January 2015 British companies established in 1836 History of Norfolk Wholesalers of the United Kingdom Companies based in Coventry Building materials companies of the United Kingdom Saint-Gobain