Superdrug

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Superdrug, the UK's second largest health and beauty chain (behind Boots), was founded in 1966 when the two brothers, Ronald and Peter Goldstein, opened their first store in Putney High Street, London.

Superdrug is a national company with over 700 stores in the UK. In 1964 Ronald and Peter Goldstein decided to set up the company after spending several years in a grocery retailing industry. They decided to use their trading skills and start a toiletry retailing business its first name was Leading Supermarkets Limited but changed their name later in the year. The first Superdrug store opened on April 26th after that they expanded buying hundreds of warehouse space to service their stores. Superdrug has grown over the years and now has over 700 stores in operation employing over 13,000 people with retail jobs. The stores serve over 4.5 million customers each week. Sales of Superdrug are over £1 billion per year. Its mission is to provide up-to-the-minute heath and beauty products for Superdrug customers.

Superdrug has over 10,000 products in its stores it supplies vitamins, toiletries, drinks and snacks, photographic film accessories, newspapers, magazines and household accessories. Superdrug is against animal testing its own brand manufactures do not commission animal testing on any own brands, products or ingredients.

The chain grew rapidly and in less than a decade grew to a chain of 40 stores. In 1971, The Rite Aid Corporation, an American drugstore chain, acquired 49% of the business.

By 1981, the chain had grown to 100 stores and opened its 11,148 m² (120,000 ft²) distribution centre and office complex at Beddington Lane in Croydon. This, and another distribution centre in Pontefract, still service the chain today. Later in that year, the business was floated on London's AIM stock market.

In 1987, Superdrug was sold to Woolworth Holdings (now known as Kingfisher PLC) for £257 million. This allowed accelerated growth of the brand through utilization of Kingfisher's surplus high street property portfolio and substantial financial assets. In this year Superdrug acquired Tip-Tip, a discount drugstore chain which had a large presence in the north of England and Scotland, and ShareDrug, a southern based chain. These acquisitions and a continually aggressive expansion programme saw the chain grow to 600 outlets throughout the UK.

Superdrug continued to grow over the next 8 years increasing profitability and market share. In 1995, the company began a rebranding programme which saw it leave behind its discount heritage and move upmarket, with a new corporate identity - under the banner "the real beauty is the price" - and new larger stores in prime retail locations.

This led to a marked increase in prices in order to fund a higher cost base. This left the chain vulnerable to attack from new discount chains such as Savers and Wilkinson's, who were rapidly expanding at the time and the supermarkets such as Tesco and ASDA who were growing their presence in the high margin non-food sector.

Facing increasing pressure from supermarkets and new discount chains Superdrug was sold to Kruidvat, a drugstore operator from continental Europe to allow Kingfisher to focus on its DIY and electrical chains.

Kruidvat was subsequently sold to AS Watson, the retail and manufacturing business of the Hong Kong conglomerate Hutchison Whampoa in 2002. AS Watson are also the parent company of Savers, the UK's number three drugstore chain.

In 2003, Superdrug, in conjunction with Hutchison's international branding function (behind brands such as PowWow and Orange), launched another rebranding campaign which saw all stores being rebranded in the new "you star" style.

A store-by-store review was conducted as part of this exercise and many of Superdrug's smaller stores were converted to the Savers format. The opposite is now happening: in towns where there is a Savers store but no Superdrug, the Savers is being converted into a Superdrug. In towns where there are both, the Savers is generally being closed.

The estate now consists of 1180 Superdrug and Savers stores.