Cash Converters

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Cash Converters International Limited

Type	Public
Founded	1984 in Perth, Western Australia
Headquarters
Industry	Retail
Website	www.cashconverters.com

Cash Converters International Limited is a world-wide franchise company that specialises in stores that buy and sell second-hand goods and offer loans to people. The firm has been credited as

"a modern, efficient version of an old retail form – pawnbroking" ^[1].

This company began in Perth, Western Australia, in 1984. It was founded by Brian Cumins and a group of partners. In four years, the partners were operating seven separate outlets in the Perth area under a variety of trading fascias. Having proved the concept, the partners converted all seven outlets overnight to a prototype of the current Cash Converters style. The first international expansion was into the UK in 1992 – an operation that expanded to 105 stores by 2005. New Zealand (1993, now 27 stores), South Africa (1994, 57 stores), France (1994, 23 stores), Canada (1995, 24 stores), Spain (1995, 34 stores) and the US (1994, 24 stores, primarily in North Carolina, Virginia, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and the Chicago area) as well as Malaysia (4 stores) followed^[1].

Recently, the United Kingdom division launched an eBay-style auction site, using selected branch stock, which also carry warranties, unlike the more established site.

[edit] References

^ ^a ^b André Sammartino (2007), 'Retail’, in Dick, H. & Merrett, D. (eds.), The Internationalisation Strategies of Small-Country Firms: The Australian Experience of Globalisation, Edward Elgar: Cheltenham, UK, pp.175-194.