page_title: British Home Stores
section_title: Sale and restructuring
hierarchical_section_title: British Home Stores / History / Sale and restructuring
caption_attribution_description: English: BHS, High Street, Lincoln, Lincolnshire, England. Taken on the evening of Sunday the 13th of December 2015.
context_page_description: British Home Stores, commonly abbreviated to BHS and latterly legally styled BHS Ltd, was a British department store chain, primarily selling clothing and household items. In its later years, the company began to expand into furniture, electronics, entertainment, convenience groceries and fragrance and beauty products.
  The company was founded in 1928 by a group of U.S. entrepreneurs, and had a total of 163 stores mainly located in high streets or shopping centres by the time of its closure in 2016, as well as 74 international stores across 18 separate territories.
  BHS was previously a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index, but was bought by Sir Philip Green in 2000 and taken private. The company became part of Green's Arcadia Group in 2009. Following a number of loss-making years, the company was sold to the consortium Retail Acquisitions Ltd led by the serial bankrupt Dominic Chappell, in March 2015 for the nominal price of £1.
  In April 2016, 13 months after the purchase by Retail Acquisitions, the company entered administration following unsuccessful attempts to continue trading.
context_section_description: On 12 March 2015, it was announced that BHS had been sold to Retail Acquisitions for a nominal price of £1. It was also confirmed that Richard Price had left his post as managing director for a position with the clothing arm of Tesco; former BHS Chief Operating Officer Darren Topp was confirmed as the interim Chief Executive. Shortly after the takeover, 51 of the company's 171 stores were reported as being under threat of closure.
  In September 2015, BHS owners Retail Acquisitions announced another rebrand, as part of a £60m rejuvenation plan, which resulted in the full British Home Stores name being resurrected on the high street for the first time since 1986. A programme of modernising stores with the new branding was announced, while plans to roll out food halls were to continue.
  By early 2016, periodic store closures had seen the company withdraw entirely from several city centres including Bath, Cardiff, Carlisle, Oxford, Reading and Southampton. Plans were also being made to reduce the size of the flagship Oxford Street branch by leasing excess space to other retailers.
  In March 2016, the company sought a company voluntary arrangement (CVA) to allow it to restructure the business. As part of its application, it revealed a deficit in its pension scheme of £207 million, and sought to transfer its schemes to the Pension Protection Fund. A consortium led by the banker Nicholas de Scossa was involved in negotiations to buy the company.
caption: A branch with post-2015 branding seen in Lincoln in 2015.
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