Thailand’s Central Group and Austrian firm to buy Selfridges
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The Selfridges Group portfolio comprises 18 department stores including Selfridges in London, Manchester and Birmingham, de Bijenkorf in Netherlands, Brown Thomas and Arnotts in Ireland, their associated ecommerce platforms and the properties in London, Manchester and five locations in Ireland.
The transaction will see Selfridges Group become part of the combined Central and Signa portfolio of luxury department stores, which owns Rinascente in Italy, Illum in Denmark, Globus in Switzerland and The KaDeWe Group, which operates in Germany and Austria (starting in 2024).
The pro forma annual turnover for the combined department stores portfolio was EUR 5 billion in 2019 and is projected to grow to more than EUR 7 billion by 2024.
The combination will create a complementary portfolio of leading European luxury department stores, which will enable innovation know-how and knowledge-sharing to be shared across different locations.
The parties expect closing to occur upon the receipt of regulatory approvals and the satisfaction of other closing conditions. ■