History
The Company was founded by the entrepreneur Selim Zilkha and Sir James Goldsmith in 1961. It was first listed on the London Stock Exchange in 1972.
In 1982 it merged with Habitat to form Habitat Mothercare plc and in 1986 Habitat Mothercare plc merged with British Home Stores to form Storehouse plc. It bought Children's World from Boots in 1996, and rebranded all of their superstores Mothercare World stores. In 2000 the Bhs stores were sold to Philip Green and Storehouse reverted to the Mothercare brand.
Mothercare agreed to buy the Early Learning Centre (ELC) in April 2007 for £85 million.
In 2007 Mothercare launched Gurgle, a pregnancy and parenting social networking website. In November 2009 Mothercare acquired the 50% of Gurgle that it did not already own.
In July 2010, Mothercare bought the trademark and brand of privately owned rival Blooming Marvellous.
In 2011 it was reported that Mothercare was set to undergo a major restructure in their retail sector resulting in an undisclosed number ELC stores moving into neighbouring Mothercare stores to lower costs.
Read more about this topic: Mothercare
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