Edgars, owned by Edcon, saw its fortunes dwindle and debts rise over the past decade as more international brands made way into South Africa at a time when the country was in the throes of weak consumer spending and poor economic growth.
But plans did not reach fruition as the coronavirus pandemic forced the beleaguered retailer to temporarily close, pushing it into a form a bankruptcy protection in April. Its outlets are largely located outside core metropolitan nodes where a majority of its low-to-middle income target market exists. Themba N. Independent Non-Executive Chairman. Tjeludo Ndlovu. Group Chief Executive Officer. Zebhediah Vella. Chief Accounting Officer, Executive Director.
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The company launched an expansion of its goods offerings, adding men's and boy's clothing to its original women's wear fashions. Through the end of the decade, the company's stores grew to include footwear, fabrics and other household textiles, and jewelry.
Edgars also extended its reach to neighboring Zimbabwe, opening its first store there in The s marked an era of strong growth for the Edgars chain, and by , the company already boasted nearly stores.
The company stepped up its expansion in the new decade, more than doubling its stores by The mids marked the launch of an acquisition phase, starting with the purchase of the Sales House brand in In that year, also, the company picked up U. Edgars' U. In the meantime, the company had acquired another strong South Africa store format, Jet Stores, which featured seven supermarkets in The company later transformed the Jet brand into one of the country's leading fashion retailers, a process begun in the early s with a massive expansion--between and the company opened nearly 80 Jet stores.
Part of this stock came from another aborted expansion effort, the acquisition of five Dan Hands furniture stores in After a rapid expansion, with 35 new stores opened before the end of , the company sold off the brand in Instead, Edgars returned its focus to its Edgars chain. In the mids, the company opened a new generation of "flagship" stores, the first of which opened in Parow in A second flagship opened in Durban the following year.
The flagship format continued to grow, and included a 10,square-meter store opened on Market Street in Johannesburg in Serving the company's logistics needs was its new distribution center, opening in Johannesburg that same year. That building was joined by a new corporate headquarters in , in time for the company's 50th anniversary. By the early s, under Sydney Press, Edgars had grown to a nationally operating business posting sales of more than ZAR million per year.
The company attempted a new expansion, acquiring the Ackermans Chain Stores group from Greatermans in The Ackermans format featured discount clothing and textiles. The extension failed, however, and Ackermans was sold off again in In the meantime, Sydney Press, who had guided the company for more than 45 years, lost control of Edgars in In that year, and reportedly while Press lay in a hospital bed following open-heart surgery, control of the company was taken by South African Breweries SAB.
The event sparked the beginning of a longstanding family feud among the Press family. Under SAB, however, Edgars flourished. New CEO and managing director Vic Hammond steered the company on its greatest expansion, and by , when Hammond stepped down, the group had established itself as a South African retail empire with sales of nearly ZAR 2 billion.
Part of that expansion came from the launch of a third-generation Edgars flagship format. Edgars continued to grow strongly into the first half of the s, more than doubling sales to top ZAR 4. By then, the company's retail network of more than stores covered a total selling space of , square meters. In addition to the Jet and Edgars formats, the company operated a number of other store brands, including Cuthberts shoe brand, which had pioneered self-service shoe sales in South Africa; the more traditional ABC shoe stores; Sales House; and Smiley's Wearhouse.
Into the second half of the s, the Edgars chain began expanding its store formats. The Edgars chain in particular expanded through the addition of a number of new in-store concept boutiques, including the Red Square cosmetics corner and a sunglasses department, Accessoreyes.
Other boutiques tested by the company during the period included a denim corner, The Issue; a sportswear boutique, Starting Block; and Studio Quattro, which sold watches and jewelry. In addition to being developed as in-store corners, the company also launched a number of self-standing boutiques.
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