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Selfridges, also known as Selfridge & Co., is a chain of high end department stores in the United Kingdom. It was founded by Harry Gordon Selfridge. The flagship store on London's Oxford Street is the second largest shop in the UK (after Harrods) and opened 15 March 1909.〔(【引用サイトリンク】 url=http://www.selfridges.com/index.cfm? )〕 In the 1940s, smaller provincial Selfridge stores were sold to the John Lewis Partnership, and in 1951 the original Oxford Street store was acquired by the Liverpool-based Lewis's chain of department stores.〔(【引用サイトリンク】 url=http://www.liverpoolwiki.org/Lewis%27s )〕 Lewis's and Selfridges were then taken over in 1965 by the Sears Group owned by Charles Clore.〔subscription required〕 Expanded under the Sears group to include branches in Manchester and Birmingham,〔 in 2003 the chain was acquired by Canada's Galen Weston for £598 million. The shop's history was dramatised in 2013 in the British television series ''Mr Selfridge''. Other Selfridges stores opened in the Trafford Centre (1998); Exchange Square (2002) in Manchester; and in the Bullring, Birmingham (2003). ==History== The basis of Selfridge's success was his relentlessly innovative marketing, which was elaborately expressed in his Oxford Street store. Originally from America himself, Selfridge attempted to dismantle the idea that consumerism was strictly an American phenomenon.〔 He tried to make shopping a fun adventure and a form of leisure instead of a chore, transforming the department store into a social and cultural landmark that provided women with a public space in which they could be comfortable and legitimately indulge themselves. Emphasizing the importance of creating a welcome environment, he placed merchandise on display so customers could examine it, moved the highly profitable perfume counter front-and-centre on the ground floor, and established policies that made it safe and easy for customers to shop. These techniques have been adopted by modern department stores around the world. Either Selfridge or Marshall Field is popularly held to have coined the phrase "the customer is always right",〔(【引用サイトリンク】 url=http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/106700.html )〕 and Selfridge used it regularly in his advertising. Selfridge attracted shoppers with educational and scientific exhibits and was himself interested in education and science, believing that the displays would introduce potential new customers to Selfridges and thus generate both immediate and long-term sales. In 1909, after the first cross-Channel flight, Louis Blériot's monoplane was put on display at Selfridges, where it was seen by 12,000 people. John Logie Baird made the first public demonstration of moving silhouette images by television from the first floor of Selfridges from 1 to 27 April 1925. In the 1920s and 1930s, the roof of the store hosted terraced gardens, cafes, a mini golf course and an all-girl gun club. The roof, with its spectacular views across London, was a popular place for strolling after a shopping trip and was often used for fashion shows. During the Second World War the store was bombed but survived comparatively unscathed besides the famous roof gardens, which were destroyed and not reopened until 2009. A Milne-Shaw seismograph was set up on the Oxford Street store's third floor in 1932 and attached to one of the building's main stanchions, where it remained unaffected by traffic or shoppers. It successfully recorded the Belgian earthquake of 11 June 1938, which was also felt in London. In 1947, it was given to the British Museum. The huge SIGSALY scrambling apparatus, by which transatlantic conferences between American and British officials (most notably Winston Churchill and Franklin D. Roosevelt) were secured against eavesdropping, was housed in the basement from 1943 on, with extension to the Cabinet War Rooms about a mile away. In 1926 Selfridges set up the Selfridge Provincial Stores company which had expanded over the years to include sixteen provincial stores, but these were sold to the John Lewis Partnership in 1940. The Liverpool-based Lewis's chain of department stores acquired the remaining Oxford Street Shop in 1951 until it was taken over in 1965 by the Sears Group owned by Charles Clore.〔 Under the Sears group, branches in Ilford and Oxford opened, with the latter remaining Selfridges until 1986 when Sears rebranded it as a Lewis's store. In 1990, Sears Holdings split Selfridges from Lewis's and placed Lewis's in administration a year later. In March 1998, Selfridges acquired its current logo in tandem with the opening of the Manchester Trafford Centre store and Selfridges' demerger from Sears. In September 1998, Selfridges expanded and opened a department store in the newly-opened Trafford Centre in Greater Manchester. Following its success, Selfridges announced they would open an additional store in Exchange Square, Manchester city centre. The Exchange Square store opened in 2002 as Manchester city centre started to return to normal following the 1996 Manchester bombing. A store opened in 2003 in Birmingham's Bull Ring. In 2003, the chain was acquired by Canada's Galen Weston for £598 million and became part of (Selfridges Group ), which also includes Brown Thomas in Ireland, Holt Renfrew in Canada and de Bijenkorf in the Netherlands. Weston, a retailing expert who is also the owner of major supermarket chains in Canada, has chosen to invest in the renovation of the Oxford Street store – rather than to create new stores in British cities other than Manchester and Birmingham. Anne Pitcher is the Managing Director of Selfridges, while Irish retailer, Paul Kelly, who has worked for the Weston organisation since the mid-1980s is Managing Director of Selfridges Group. In October 2009, Selfridges revived its rooftop entertainment with the opening of The Restaurant on the Roof. In July 2011, Truvia created an emerald green boating lake (with a waterfall, a boat-up cocktail bar and a forest of Stevia plants). In 2012 the Big Rooftop Tea and Golf Party featured "the highest afternoon tea on Oxford Street" and a nine-hole golf course with "the seven wonders of London" realised in cake as obstacles.〔(【引用サイトリンク】url=http://style.selfridges.com/self-expression/1920-%E2%80%93-2012-look-back-selfridges%E2%80%99-legendary-roof )〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Selfridges」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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