HMV Group
Encyclopedia
HMV is a British global entertainment
retail chain and is the largest of its kind in the United Kingdom and Ireland
. The company also operates in Hong Kong and Singapore
. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange
and is a constituent of the FTSE Fledgling Index
. Acquisitions by the HMV Group include Waterstone's
in 1998 from W H Smith
(sold in 2011), the music retailer Fopp
in August 2007, and selected Zavvi
retail outlets in February 2009.
Simon Fox has been Chief Executive Officer since 28 September 2006. For this role he is paid an annual salary of £873,000. HMV stands for His Master's Voice, a painting created in 1899 by Francis Barraud
, A.R.A., of the dog Nipper
listening to a cylinder phonograph. For advertising purposes this was changed to a wind-up gramophone
, and eventually used simply as a silhouette.
opened the first HMV shop in London, England; the composer Sir Edward Elgar participated in the opening ceremonies. In March 1931 the Gramophone Company merged with Columbia Graphophone Company
to form Electric and Musical Industries Ltd (EMI).
From the 1930s onwards, HMV manufactured radio and television sets under the HMV and Marconiphone
brand names in their factory at Hayes
Middlesex
. The name HMV became synonymous with the highest quality; an HMV radiogram with a Garrard
automatic record changer was regarded as the Rolls Royce of radio and carried a correspondingly high price tag. There were to be seen only in the homes of the upper middle class such as doctors and solicitors. They were also popular as a retirement present for long serving company executives.
In 1966, HMV began expanding its retail operations in London. Throughout the 1970s, the company continued to expand, doubling in size, and in six years became the country's leading specialist music retailers. It faced new competition, however, from Virgin Megastores, established in 1976, and Our Price
, established in 1972. Subsequently, HMV overtook Our Price
in popularity and threatened their existence, having established a chain of newer, larger stores.
Growth continued for a third decade in the 1990s. In 1996, when the company celebrated its 75 year anniversary, there were over 300 HMV Music stores internationally.
In 1998, HMV Media was spun off from EMI, leaving EMI with a 43% stake in HMV Media. The same year, the Company bought the Waterstone's
chain of bookshops and merged them with Dillons
.
was the CEO.
In 2002, the company floated on the London Stock Exchange
as HMV Group plc, leaving EMI with only a token holding.
All HMV stores in Germany were closed in 2003.
In 2006, the HMV Group took over the Ottakar's
book chain, via Waterstone's
, with which it was merged into, in a similar situation to the acquisition of Dillons
. This merger tied in to HMV's strategy for growth, as many of the Ottakar's branches were in smaller towns and outposts.
. On 7 February 2006, HMV Group received a £762 million conditional takeover bid (based on 190p
a share) from Permira, however it was rejected on the basis that it was an insufficient valuation of the company.
On 13 March 2006, HMV released a press statement declining a second offer from the private equity firm, even though it increased the value of the company, HMV felt that their firm was being undervalued and so rejected that offer of takeover as well. By the beginning of March 2006, HMV released a statement that the Permira offer undervalued the medium and long term prospects for the Group, resulting in Permira's withdrawal from the bidding.
In 2007, HMV selected CLIC Sargent
as its charity partner until 2010.
In the 2008 MCV Industry Excellence Awards, HMV was given the title 'Entertainment Retailer of the Year'.
On 1 September 2008, HMV Group launched Get Closer, a social networking site which allows users to import their own music library and rivals current providers including Napster
and the iTunes Store
which are both examples of an online music store
.
As part of chief executive Simon Fox's plans to turn the retailer into an entertainment group for all seasons, HMV started a joint venture with Curzon Artificial Eye to bring cinemas to HMV and Waterstone's
stores across England. The first trial store was in Wimbledon
, London. The cinema is located above the shop in a former storage room and has been converted in to three separate screens and a bar. It has its own entrance, so it can be accessed outside store hours, as well as one within the store. The trial was deemed a success and HMV plan to open more, with HMV in Cheltenham
, Gloucestershire and Waterstone's
in Piccadilly
, London lined up next.
On 5 January 2011, HMV announced that profits would be at the lower end of analysts' forecasts due to falling sales, resulting in the share price falling by 20% and an announcement of the group's intention to close 40 HMV stores, as well as 20 Waterstone's stores, mainly in towns and cities where the company operates at multiple locations. The first of the store closures began at the end of January 2011.
On 5 February 2011, HMV Ireland announced that its profits fell by almost 90% to €465,000 last year compared to €4.1 million the previous year. It has not yet been confirmed whether some of the 27 stores operating in Ireland will cease trading under the redevelopment strategy currently being undertaken by HMV.
On 29 June 2011, the sale of Waterstone's to A&NN Capital Fund Management for £53 million was completed and was approved by the vast majority of shareholders at an emergency general meeting.
Waterstones then announced that it had successfully negotiated a takeover of Ottakar's on 31 May 2006.
All 130 Ottakar's stores were rebranded as Waterstone's prior to Christmas 2006. In March 2007, new Group CEO Simon Fox announced a 10% reduction over three years in the enlarged Waterstone's total store space, comprising mostly dual location shops created by the acquisition of Ottakar's.
went into administration
, with the closure of 81 stores and 700 staff made redundant. Towards the end of the month, HMV bought the Fopp brand and six of its stores. HMV claimed that the six stores had traded profitably prior to their closure, and that the deal would save around 70 jobs. They later added a seventh Fopp store to its portfolio. They will continue to trade under the Fopp brand. Since, HMV did have ten stores trading under the Fopp Banner, which included the opening two new stores in Exeter and Gower Street, London which did not have a Fopp Store previously. They closed the Fopp Exeter store on 30 January 2011 due to the recent developments surrounding HMV's share price fall. Nine stores are still open under HMV ownership.
, HMV's rival Zavvi
, also an entertainment retailer, entered into administration. On 14 January 2009, a placing announcement by the company revealed that they intend to acquire 14 of Zavvi's stores.
On 18 February 2009, five additional Zavvi stores were purchased by HMV Group, all will be rebranded to HMV outlets. A 6th store has been taken over from Zavvi: this is a store in Exeter
's modern Princesshay
Development. The acquisitions by HMV were investigated and cleared by the Office of Fair Trading
in April 2009.
, to run 11 live music venues, including the Hammersmith Apollo
which is set to be renamed to the HMV Apollo. Other venues purchased include The Forum in London's Kentish Town, the Birmingham Institute and Aberdeen's Warehouse. HMV will also use the opportunity to create a tickets division which will have benefits for HMV loyalty card members.
A few months later HMV entered into a joint venture with MAMA Group
. The Group had purchased a 50% stake in MAMA Group in January 2009 as part of a deal to introduce the HMV brand to live music venues, including the Hammersmith Apollo
. On 23 December 2009, it decided to buy the whole of the MAMA Group in a live music takeover deal worth £46m.
the dog, though its design has been updated. HMV's flagship store in Dublin, Ireland has relegated music to the basement of the store.
On 1 April 2007, HMV Group announced that Gromit, the animated dog of Wallace and Gromit
fame, would stand in for Nipper for a three month period, promoting children's DVDs in its UK stores.
s that are newly opened. HMV in Hong Kong appeals to the crowd that enjoy organized and free-sampling environment which many other records cannot match. However, the prices on their products especially those without promotion and discount are often higher than many independent record stores. HMV Hong Kong is the second place after UK that launched in-store digital kiosks. It is also the first in Asia.
There are currently five HMV stores in Hong Kong (the fifth is recently opened in Whampoa on 27 July 2011).
HMV Hong Kong once used the same stylized gramophone as HMV Japan, as shown in the accompanying photo. However, HMV Hong Kong's website presently displays the HMV UK & Ireland version of Nipper (without his gramophone), with the same lowercase logo as HMV UK & Ireland.
(which later closed down). It currently operates a single store in Singapore at 313@Somerset (which replaces one formerly in The Heeren), after closing the other at the CityLink underground mall.
It is generally higher priced than other independent shops, and the local chains like Gramophone and That CD Shop pose a serious challenge. HMV, however, is the only store that also sells games, T-shirts, books and audio gear in addition to their music and video collection.
in October 2005. The HMV group's agreement with Brazin is to phase out the HMV brand in Australia by 2010. Most HMV stores in Australia have very high overhead costs and most have been closed when their lease ends and the remaining stores converted into Sanity stores, if there is no Sanity store in the area.
HMV's Australian flagship store, located in Pitt Street Mall, Sydney
, was shut down on Friday 31 August 2007, when the Mid City Centre
shopping centre it was located in, was closed for demolition.
. HMV has also been cited as a contributor to the decline and eventual bankruptcy of two other major Canadian chains, Sam the Record Man
and Music World (HMV in Canada was created by EMI Music Canada's buyout of the faltering Mister Sound chain in the late 1980s.)
HMV stores in the U.S. and Canada did not have rights to the His Master's Voice trademark; in those countries, that trademark is part of the RCA
trademark portfolio owned by Technicolor SA and licensed to others. HMV Canada applied for use of the trademark, but its application was abandoned in 2010. Though the initials "HMV" originally came from the His Master's Voice trademark, HMV was not prevented from using its initials in the U.S. & Canada.
HMV had a handful of stores in the Eastern United States, which in their final years were overseen by HMV's Canadian operations. In the 1990s they had a significant presence in Manhattan.
Poor real estate decisions made in the early 1990s rendered the United States stores uneconomical and HMV gradually extricated itself from leases, with the final store in the United States, having lost £500,000 in 2003 and £1 million in 2004, closed on 3 November 2004.
In contrast, HMV has a strong position in Canada's music market, with 116 stores as of October 2007. For the last two decades, HMV has been awarded "Canadian Music Retailer of the Year".
In 2005, HMV Canada took over a Virgin Megastore
in Vancouver, allowing it to own, "Canada’s largest store dedicated to music and DVD".
In June 2010, HMV Canada launched Purehmv
, a customer rewards program that offers store discounts and exclusive items across worlds of Music, Film, and Gaming in exchange for points gained in-store.
In recent years, HMV Canada has encountered controversy by removing from sale all music and video recordings made by artists that have made exclusive distribution deals with other retailers for particular limited-edition or early-release titles; artists affected by this move include Alanis Morissette
, The Rolling Stones
and KISS
.
In June 2011, HMV sold its Canadian stores for £2 million to Hilco UK, a firm specializing in failing retail stores.
On November 3rd, 2011 it was announced that the iconic, flagship store in Downtown Vancouver, would close in January
of 2012, with no formal date given in a phone interview by President of Canadian operations. It was also noted that a smaller location would open in a different area of Downtown Vancouver at some time in the future, but no further details were disclosed. The same announcement brought forth detailed plans to close the location in Richmond Centre (mall)
as well.
Since JVC Kenwood Holdings
(thru its JVC
and Victor Entertainment
subsidiaries) controls the His Master's Voice trademark in Japan, HMV Japan uses as its trademark a stylized gramophone of its own design. As with the former U.S. & Canadian operations, HMV Japan's use of the initials "HMV" has never been challenged.
. On 2 November 2000, the company changed its name to Sa Re Ga Ma India Ltd.
. Sa Re Ga Ma controls a large repertoire of Indian film and non-film music, spanning a century.
, book
s, Blu-ray disc
s, CDs
, computer
software and hardware
, DVDs, video games and most recently have expanded their range of clothing and fashion items through "The Studio" section of their stores.
Entertainment
Entertainment consists of any activity which provides a diversion or permits people to amuse themselves in their leisure time. Entertainment is generally passive, such as watching opera or a movie. Active forms of amusement, such as sports, are more often considered to be recreation...
retail chain and is the largest of its kind in the United Kingdom and Ireland
Republic of Ireland
Ireland , described as the Republic of Ireland , is a sovereign state in Europe occupying approximately five-sixths of the island of the same name. Its capital is Dublin. Ireland, which had a population of 4.58 million in 2011, is a constitutional republic governed as a parliamentary democracy,...
. The company also operates in Hong Kong and Singapore
Singapore
Singapore , officially the Republic of Singapore, is a Southeast Asian city-state off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, north of the equator. An island country made up of 63 islands, it is separated from Malaysia by the Straits of Johor to its north and from Indonesia's Riau Islands by the...
. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange
London Stock Exchange
The London Stock Exchange is a stock exchange located in the City of London within the United Kingdom. , the Exchange had a market capitalisation of US$3.7495 trillion, making it the fourth-largest stock exchange in the world by this measurement...
and is a constituent of the FTSE Fledgling Index
FTSE Fledgling Index
The FTSE Fledgling Index consists of under 200 UK companies outside of the FTSE All-Share Index.This Index is calculated in real-time and published every minute.-Current constituents of the FTSE Fledgling Index:*AEA Technology*AXA Property Trust Ld...
. Acquisitions by the HMV Group include Waterstone's
Waterstone's
Waterstone's is a British book specialist established in 1982 by Tim Waterstone that employs around 4,500 staff throughout the United Kingdom and Europe....
in 1998 from W H Smith
W H Smith
WHSmith plc is a British retailer, headquartered in Swindon, Wiltshire, England. It is best known for its chain of high street, railway station, airport, hospital and motorway service station shops selling books, stationery, magazines, newspapers, and entertainment products...
(sold in 2011), the music retailer Fopp
Fopp (retailer)
Fopp is a chain of retail stores selling music, film, books and other entertainment products in the United Kingdom.-History:From its origins as a one-man stall in Glasgow, Scotland, in 1981, it expanded to a chain of over 100 branches throughout the country in 2007...
in August 2007, and selected Zavvi
Zavvi
Zavvi was an entertainment retail chain in the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland, originally Virgin Megastores. Zavvi was formed in September 2007 when a management buy-out team purchased the company from Sir Richard Branson's Virgin Group....
retail outlets in February 2009.
Simon Fox has been Chief Executive Officer since 28 September 2006. For this role he is paid an annual salary of £873,000. HMV stands for His Master's Voice, a painting created in 1899 by Francis Barraud
Francis Barraud
Francis James Barraud was an English painter - the son of artist Henry Barraud.His most famous work, His Master's Voice, is one of the best-known commercial logos in the world, having inspired the music industry trademark depicting a dog and phonograph, which is used by several corporations,...
, A.R.A., of the dog Nipper
Nipper
Nipper was a dog that served as the model for a painting titled His Late Master's Voice. This image was the basis for the dog and trumpet logo used by several audio recording and associated brands: His Master's Voice, HMV, RCA, Victor Talking Machine Company, RCA Victor and JVC.- Biography :Nipper...
listening to a cylinder phonograph. For advertising purposes this was changed to a wind-up gramophone
Phonograph
The phonograph record player, or gramophone is a device introduced in 1877 that has had continued common use for reproducing sound recordings, although when first developed, the phonograph was used to both record and reproduce sounds...
, and eventually used simply as a silhouette.
20th Century
In 1921, the Gramophone CompanyGramophone Company
The Gramophone Company, based in the United Kingdom, was one of the early recording companies, and was the parent organization for the famous "His Master's Voice" label...
opened the first HMV shop in London, England; the composer Sir Edward Elgar participated in the opening ceremonies. In March 1931 the Gramophone Company merged with Columbia Graphophone Company
Columbia Graphophone Company
The Columbia Graphophone Company was one of the earliest gramophone companies in the United Kingdom. Under EMI, as Columbia Records, it became a very successful label in the 1950s and 1960s...
to form Electric and Musical Industries Ltd (EMI).
From the 1930s onwards, HMV manufactured radio and television sets under the HMV and Marconiphone
Marconiphone
Marconiphone was an English manufacturer of domestic receiving equipment, notably radio receivers and reel-to-reel tape machines.- History :After World War I, the Marconi Company began producing non-industrial receivers, principally for the amateur market, at the Soho premises of The Marconi...
brand names in their factory at Hayes
Hayes, Hillingdon
Hayes is a town in the London Borough of Hillingdon, West London. It is a suburban development situated west of Charing Cross. Hayes was developed in the late 19th and 20th centuries as an industrial locality to which residential districts were later added in order to house factory workers...
Middlesex
Middlesex
Middlesex is one of the historic counties of England and the second smallest by area. The low-lying county contained the wealthy and politically independent City of London on its southern boundary and was dominated by it from a very early time...
. The name HMV became synonymous with the highest quality; an HMV radiogram with a Garrard
Garrard Engineering and Manufacturing Company
The Garrard Engineering and Manufacturing Company of Swindon, Wiltshire was a British company which was famous for producing high-quality gramophone turntables. It was formed by the jewellers Garrard & Co in 1915 to create precision rangefinders, as they had the specialist equipment necessary. The...
automatic record changer was regarded as the Rolls Royce of radio and carried a correspondingly high price tag. There were to be seen only in the homes of the upper middle class such as doctors and solicitors. They were also popular as a retirement present for long serving company executives.
Our Price
Our Price was a chain of record stores in the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland from 1972 until 2004. Originally founded in 1972 by Gary Nesbitt, Edward Stollins and Mike Isaacs, early stores were branded "The Tape Revolution" and concentrated on the then-new compact cassette format.The name...
, established in 1972. Subsequently, HMV overtook Our Price
Our Price
Our Price was a chain of record stores in the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland from 1972 until 2004. Originally founded in 1972 by Gary Nesbitt, Edward Stollins and Mike Isaacs, early stores were branded "The Tape Revolution" and concentrated on the then-new compact cassette format.The name...
in popularity and threatened their existence, having established a chain of newer, larger stores.
Growth continued for a third decade in the 1990s. In 1996, when the company celebrated its 75 year anniversary, there were over 300 HMV Music stores internationally.
In 1998, HMV Media was spun off from EMI, leaving EMI with a 43% stake in HMV Media. The same year, the Company bought the Waterstone's
Waterstone's
Waterstone's is a British book specialist established in 1982 by Tim Waterstone that employs around 4,500 staff throughout the United Kingdom and Europe....
chain of bookshops and merged them with Dillons
Dillons Booksellers
Dillons was a bookshop and subsequently a bookselling chain, based in the United Kingdom, which traded between 1932 and 1999.Founded by Una Dillon in 1932, Dillons was for most of its history most closely associated with its signature building on Gower Street in London, near University College...
.
21st Century
From March 1999 through September 2006, Alan GilesAlan Giles
Alan Giles is Chairman of Fat Face, the active lifestyle retailer.He was chief executive officer of HMV Group, owner of record shop HMV, which he joined in 1998, from March 1999 until September 2006....
was the CEO.
In 2002, the company floated on the London Stock Exchange
London Stock Exchange
The London Stock Exchange is a stock exchange located in the City of London within the United Kingdom. , the Exchange had a market capitalisation of US$3.7495 trillion, making it the fourth-largest stock exchange in the world by this measurement...
as HMV Group plc, leaving EMI with only a token holding.
All HMV stores in Germany were closed in 2003.
In 2006, the HMV Group took over the Ottakar's
Ottakar's
Ottakar's was a chain of bookshops in the United Kingdom founded in 1987 by James Heneage. Following a takeover by the HMV Group plc in 2006, the chain was merged into the Waterstone's brand.-History:...
book chain, via Waterstone's
Waterstone's
Waterstone's is a British book specialist established in 1982 by Tim Waterstone that employs around 4,500 staff throughout the United Kingdom and Europe....
, with which it was merged into, in a similar situation to the acquisition of Dillons
Dillons Booksellers
Dillons was a bookshop and subsequently a bookselling chain, based in the United Kingdom, which traded between 1932 and 1999.Founded by Una Dillon in 1932, Dillons was for most of its history most closely associated with its signature building on Gower Street in London, near University College...
. This merger tied in to HMV's strategy for growth, as many of the Ottakar's branches were in smaller towns and outposts.
Permira bid
The Christmas period of 2005 was disastrous for the HMV Group, with many product areas falling in sales. As a result, HMV itself became susceptible to a takeover, this time from a private equity firm called PermiraPermira
Permira is a United Kingdom-based private equity firm with global reach. The firm advises funds with a total committed capital of approximately €20 billion....
. On 7 February 2006, HMV Group received a £762 million conditional takeover bid (based on 190p
Pence sterling
The penny sterling is a subdivision of pound sterling, the currency for the United Kingdom. It is currently of a pound, but historically was of a pound...
a share) from Permira, however it was rejected on the basis that it was an insufficient valuation of the company.
On 13 March 2006, HMV released a press statement declining a second offer from the private equity firm, even though it increased the value of the company, HMV felt that their firm was being undervalued and so rejected that offer of takeover as well. By the beginning of March 2006, HMV released a statement that the Permira offer undervalued the medium and long term prospects for the Group, resulting in Permira's withdrawal from the bidding.
Recent development
HMV began piloting their refreshed loyalty scheme during 2008 under the name "pure hmv". The scheme had previously ceased to operate after being introduced in August 2003.In 2007, HMV selected CLIC Sargent
CLIC Sargent
CLIC Sargent is charity in the United Kingdom that was formed by the merger of Sargent Cancer Care for Children and Cancer and Leukaemia in Childhood in 2005. The charity specializes in providing support for children with cancer....
as its charity partner until 2010.
In the 2008 MCV Industry Excellence Awards, HMV was given the title 'Entertainment Retailer of the Year'.
On 1 September 2008, HMV Group launched Get Closer, a social networking site which allows users to import their own music library and rivals current providers including Napster
Napster (pay service)
Napster is an online music store and a Best Buy company. It was originally founded as a file sharing service. For more information about its founding mission as a free file sharing service, see Napster.-History:...
and the iTunes Store
ITunes Store
The iTunes Store is a software-based online digital media store operated by Apple. Opening as the iTunes Music Store on April 28, 2003, with over 200,000 items to purchase, it is, as of April 2008, the number-one music vendor in the United States...
which are both examples of an online music store
Online music store
An online music store is an online business which sells audio files, usually music, on a per-song and/or subscription basis. It may be differentiated from music streaming services in that the music store offers the actual music file, while streaming services offer partial or full listening without...
.
As part of chief executive Simon Fox's plans to turn the retailer into an entertainment group for all seasons, HMV started a joint venture with Curzon Artificial Eye to bring cinemas to HMV and Waterstone's
Waterstone's
Waterstone's is a British book specialist established in 1982 by Tim Waterstone that employs around 4,500 staff throughout the United Kingdom and Europe....
stores across England. The first trial store was in Wimbledon
Wimbledon, London
Wimbledon is a district in the south west area of London, England, located south of Wandsworth, and east of Kingston upon Thames. It is situated within Greater London. It is home to the Wimbledon Tennis Championships and New Wimbledon Theatre, and contains Wimbledon Common, one of the largest areas...
, London. The cinema is located above the shop in a former storage room and has been converted in to three separate screens and a bar. It has its own entrance, so it can be accessed outside store hours, as well as one within the store. The trial was deemed a success and HMV plan to open more, with HMV in Cheltenham
Cheltenham
Cheltenham , also known as Cheltenham Spa, is a large spa town and borough in Gloucestershire, on the edge of the Cotswolds in the South-West region of England. It is the home of the flagship race of British steeplechase horse racing, the Gold Cup, the main event of the Cheltenham Festival held...
, Gloucestershire and Waterstone's
Waterstone's
Waterstone's is a British book specialist established in 1982 by Tim Waterstone that employs around 4,500 staff throughout the United Kingdom and Europe....
in Piccadilly
Piccadilly
Piccadilly is a major street in central London, running from Hyde Park Corner in the west to Piccadilly Circus in the east. It is completely within the city of Westminster. The street is part of the A4 road, London's second most important western artery. St...
, London lined up next.
On 5 January 2011, HMV announced that profits would be at the lower end of analysts' forecasts due to falling sales, resulting in the share price falling by 20% and an announcement of the group's intention to close 40 HMV stores, as well as 20 Waterstone's stores, mainly in towns and cities where the company operates at multiple locations. The first of the store closures began at the end of January 2011.
On 5 February 2011, HMV Ireland announced that its profits fell by almost 90% to €465,000 last year compared to €4.1 million the previous year. It has not yet been confirmed whether some of the 27 stores operating in Ireland will cease trading under the redevelopment strategy currently being undertaken by HMV.
On 29 June 2011, the sale of Waterstone's to A&NN Capital Fund Management for £53 million was completed and was approved by the vast majority of shareholders at an emergency general meeting.
Ottakar's
The Competition Commission provisionally cleared HMV Group, through Waterstones, for takeover of the Ottakar's group on 30 March 2006. The Commission stated that the takeover would "not result in a substantial lessening of competition".Waterstones then announced that it had successfully negotiated a takeover of Ottakar's on 31 May 2006.
All 130 Ottakar's stores were rebranded as Waterstone's prior to Christmas 2006. In March 2007, new Group CEO Simon Fox announced a 10% reduction over three years in the enlarged Waterstone's total store space, comprising mostly dual location shops created by the acquisition of Ottakar's.
Fopp
In early July 2007, retailers FoppFopp (retailer)
Fopp is a chain of retail stores selling music, film, books and other entertainment products in the United Kingdom.-History:From its origins as a one-man stall in Glasgow, Scotland, in 1981, it expanded to a chain of over 100 branches throughout the country in 2007...
went into administration
Administration (insolvency)
As a legal concept, administration is a procedure under the insolvency laws of a number of common law jurisdictions. It functions as a rescue mechanism for insolvent entities and allows them to carry on running their business. The process – an alternative to liquidation – is often known as going...
, with the closure of 81 stores and 700 staff made redundant. Towards the end of the month, HMV bought the Fopp brand and six of its stores. HMV claimed that the six stores had traded profitably prior to their closure, and that the deal would save around 70 jobs. They later added a seventh Fopp store to its portfolio. They will continue to trade under the Fopp brand. Since, HMV did have ten stores trading under the Fopp Banner, which included the opening two new stores in Exeter and Gower Street, London which did not have a Fopp Store previously. They closed the Fopp Exeter store on 30 January 2011 due to the recent developments surrounding HMV's share price fall. Nine stores are still open under HMV ownership.
Zavvi
On 24 December 2008, Christmas EveChristmas Eve
Christmas Eve refers to the evening or entire day preceding Christmas Day, a widely celebrated festival commemorating the birth of Jesus of Nazareth that takes place on December 25...
, HMV's rival Zavvi
Zavvi
Zavvi was an entertainment retail chain in the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland, originally Virgin Megastores. Zavvi was formed in September 2007 when a management buy-out team purchased the company from Sir Richard Branson's Virgin Group....
, also an entertainment retailer, entered into administration. On 14 January 2009, a placing announcement by the company revealed that they intend to acquire 14 of Zavvi's stores.
On 18 February 2009, five additional Zavvi stores were purchased by HMV Group, all will be rebranded to HMV outlets. A 6th store has been taken over from Zavvi: this is a store in Exeter
Exeter
Exeter is a historic city in Devon, England. It lies within the ceremonial county of Devon, of which it is the county town as well as the home of Devon County Council. Currently the administrative area has the status of a non-metropolitan district, and is therefore under the administration of the...
's modern Princesshay
Princesshay
Princesshay is a shopping mall in the city of Exeter, Devon, England. It was built in the early 1950s to replace buildings that had been destroyed in the World War II Baedeker Blitz...
Development. The acquisitions by HMV were investigated and cleared by the Office of Fair Trading
Office of Fair Trading
The Office of Fair Trading is a not-for-profit and non-ministerial government department of the United Kingdom, established by the Fair Trading Act 1973, which enforces both consumer protection and competition law, acting as the UK's economic regulator...
in April 2009.
MAMA Group
By selling additional shares, the company will raise money to fund another joint venture with the MAMA GroupMAMA Group
MAMA Group Limited is a live venue and artist management company which was founded in 2002 and is owned by the HMV Group. It is a parent company of a range of music and marketing businesses...
, to run 11 live music venues, including the Hammersmith Apollo
Hammersmith Apollo
Hammersmith Apollo is a major entertainment venue located in Hammersmith, London. Designed by Robert Cromie in Art Deco style, it opened in 1932 as the Gaumont Palace cinema, being re-named the Hammersmith Odeon in 1962...
which is set to be renamed to the HMV Apollo. Other venues purchased include The Forum in London's Kentish Town, the Birmingham Institute and Aberdeen's Warehouse. HMV will also use the opportunity to create a tickets division which will have benefits for HMV loyalty card members.
A few months later HMV entered into a joint venture with MAMA Group
MAMA Group
MAMA Group Limited is a live venue and artist management company which was founded in 2002 and is owned by the HMV Group. It is a parent company of a range of music and marketing businesses...
. The Group had purchased a 50% stake in MAMA Group in January 2009 as part of a deal to introduce the HMV brand to live music venues, including the Hammersmith Apollo
Hammersmith Apollo
Hammersmith Apollo is a major entertainment venue located in Hammersmith, London. Designed by Robert Cromie in Art Deco style, it opened in 1932 as the Gaumont Palace cinema, being re-named the Hammersmith Odeon in 1962...
. On 23 December 2009, it decided to buy the whole of the MAMA Group in a live music takeover deal worth £46m.
United Kingdom and Ireland
The company operates 379 HMV shops and 313 Waterstone's.(April 2008) HMV shops in the UK and Ireland use the His Master's Voice trademark with NipperNipper
Nipper was a dog that served as the model for a painting titled His Late Master's Voice. This image was the basis for the dog and trumpet logo used by several audio recording and associated brands: His Master's Voice, HMV, RCA, Victor Talking Machine Company, RCA Victor and JVC.- Biography :Nipper...
the dog, though its design has been updated. HMV's flagship store in Dublin, Ireland has relegated music to the basement of the store.
On 1 April 2007, HMV Group announced that Gromit, the animated dog of Wallace and Gromit
Wallace and Gromit
Wallace and Gromit are the main characters in a series consisting of four British animated short films and a feature-length film by Nick Park of Aardman Animations...
fame, would stand in for Nipper for a three month period, promoting children's DVDs in its UK stores.
Hong Kong
In 1994, HMV began operating in Hong Kong. HMV began relocating their store locations to shopping mallShopping mall
A shopping mall, shopping centre, shopping arcade, shopping precinct or simply mall is one or more buildings forming a complex of shops representing merchandisers, with interconnecting walkways enabling visitors to easily walk from unit to unit, along with a parking area — a modern, indoor version...
s that are newly opened. HMV in Hong Kong appeals to the crowd that enjoy organized and free-sampling environment which many other records cannot match. However, the prices on their products especially those without promotion and discount are often higher than many independent record stores. HMV Hong Kong is the second place after UK that launched in-store digital kiosks. It is also the first in Asia.
There are currently five HMV stores in Hong Kong (the fifth is recently opened in Whampoa on 27 July 2011).
HMV Hong Kong once used the same stylized gramophone as HMV Japan, as shown in the accompanying photo. However, HMV Hong Kong's website presently displays the HMV UK & Ireland version of Nipper (without his gramophone), with the same lowercase logo as HMV UK & Ireland.
Singapore
HMV was the second international music store to set up shop in Singapore, after Tower RecordsTower Records
Tower Records was a retail music chain that was based in Sacramento, California. It currently exists as an international franchise and an online music store....
(which later closed down). It currently operates a single store in Singapore at 313@Somerset (which replaces one formerly in The Heeren), after closing the other at the CityLink underground mall.
It is generally higher priced than other independent shops, and the local chains like Gramophone and That CD Shop pose a serious challenge. HMV, however, is the only store that also sells games, T-shirts, books and audio gear in addition to their music and video collection.
Australia
In September 2005, HMV Group decided to sell its 32 Australian stores to focus on the UK, Irish, Canadian and Asian markets. Under the HMV Australia subsidiary, these stores were sold to Brazin Limited, known briefly in the UK as Sanity Music, for AUS$7.3m (£1.7m). The company also operates the Sanity Entertainment and Virgin Entertainment (Virgin at Myer) retail chain in Australia. The horizontal merger was approved by the Australian Competition and Consumer CommissionAustralian Competition and Consumer Commission
The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission is an independent authority of the Australia government. It was established in 1995 with the amalgamation of the Australian Trade Practices Commission and the Prices Surveillance Authority to administer the Trade Practices Act 1974...
in October 2005. The HMV group's agreement with Brazin is to phase out the HMV brand in Australia by 2010. Most HMV stores in Australia have very high overhead costs and most have been closed when their lease ends and the remaining stores converted into Sanity stores, if there is no Sanity store in the area.
HMV's Australian flagship store, located in Pitt Street Mall, Sydney
Pitt Street Mall, Sydney
Pitt Street Mall is the pedestrianised section of Pitt Street in the Sydney CBD, Australia. It is one block long between Market Street and King Street and is one of Australia's busiest and most cosmopolitan shopping precincts....
, was shut down on Friday 31 August 2007, when the Mid City Centre
Mid City Centre
The Mid City Centre is a recently refurbished small shopping centre located in the heart of the Sydney central business district. Fronting the Pitt Street Mall and George Street, the Mid City Centre is an important link between two of Sydney's premier shopping streets...
shopping centre it was located in, was closed for demolition.
USA & Canada
In 1988, HMV Group began operating in Canada. This coincided with the bankruptcy, a few years later, of the Canadian record store retail chain A&A RecordsA&A Records
A&A Records was a Canadian record store chain, which declared bankruptcy in 1991. Prior to the expansion of Sam the Record Man in the early 1960s, A&A was the dominant record store chain in Canada...
. HMV has also been cited as a contributor to the decline and eventual bankruptcy of two other major Canadian chains, Sam the Record Man
Sam the Record Man
Sam the Record Man was a Canadian record store chain that, at one time, was Canada's largest music recording retailer. In 1982, their ads proclaimed they had "140 locations, coast to coast"....
and Music World (HMV in Canada was created by EMI Music Canada's buyout of the faltering Mister Sound chain in the late 1980s.)
HMV stores in the U.S. and Canada did not have rights to the His Master's Voice trademark; in those countries, that trademark is part of the RCA
RCA (trademark)
RCA is an American trademark brand owned by Technicolor SA which is used on products made by that company as well as Audiovox, ON Corporation and Sony Music Entertainment...
trademark portfolio owned by Technicolor SA and licensed to others. HMV Canada applied for use of the trademark, but its application was abandoned in 2010. Though the initials "HMV" originally came from the His Master's Voice trademark, HMV was not prevented from using its initials in the U.S. & Canada.
HMV had a handful of stores in the Eastern United States, which in their final years were overseen by HMV's Canadian operations. In the 1990s they had a significant presence in Manhattan.
Poor real estate decisions made in the early 1990s rendered the United States stores uneconomical and HMV gradually extricated itself from leases, with the final store in the United States, having lost £500,000 in 2003 and £1 million in 2004, closed on 3 November 2004.
In contrast, HMV has a strong position in Canada's music market, with 116 stores as of October 2007. For the last two decades, HMV has been awarded "Canadian Music Retailer of the Year".
In 2005, HMV Canada took over a Virgin Megastore
Virgin Megastore
Virgin Megastores is an international chain of record shops, founded by Sir Richard Branson on London's Oxford Street in early 1971. Virgin Megastores are best described today as entertainment retailers....
in Vancouver, allowing it to own, "Canada’s largest store dedicated to music and DVD".
In June 2010, HMV Canada launched Purehmv
Purehmv
purehmv Canada is a entertainment customer rewards program implemented by HMV Canada Inc. The loyalty program is modeled off of the rewards program of the same name currently active in the UK HMV stores...
, a customer rewards program that offers store discounts and exclusive items across worlds of Music, Film, and Gaming in exchange for points gained in-store.
In recent years, HMV Canada has encountered controversy by removing from sale all music and video recordings made by artists that have made exclusive distribution deals with other retailers for particular limited-edition or early-release titles; artists affected by this move include Alanis Morissette
Alanis Morissette
Alanis Nadine Morissette is a Canadian-American singer-songwriter, guitarist, record producer, and actress. She has won 16 Juno Awards and seven Grammy Awards, was nominated for two Golden Globe Awards and also shortlisted for an Academy Award nomination...
, The Rolling Stones
The Rolling Stones
The Rolling Stones are an English rock band, formed in London in April 1962 by Brian Jones , Ian Stewart , Mick Jagger , and Keith Richards . Bassist Bill Wyman and drummer Charlie Watts completed the early line-up...
and KISS
KISS (band)
Kiss is an American rock band formed in New York City in January 1973. Well-known for its members' face paint and flamboyant stage outfits, the group rose to prominence in the mid to late 1970s on the basis of their elaborate live performances, which featured fire breathing, blood spitting,...
.
In June 2011, HMV sold its Canadian stores for £2 million to Hilco UK, a firm specializing in failing retail stores.
On November 3rd, 2011 it was announced that the iconic, flagship store in Downtown Vancouver, would close in January
January
January is the first month of the year in the Julian and Gregorian calendars and one of seven months with the length of 31 days. The first day of the month is known as New Year's Day...
of 2012, with no formal date given in a phone interview by President of Canadian operations. It was also noted that a smaller location would open in a different area of Downtown Vancouver at some time in the future, but no further details were disclosed. The same announcement brought forth detailed plans to close the location in Richmond Centre (mall)
Richmond Centre (mall)
Richmond Centre is a shopping mall in Richmond, British Columbia, Canada. Officially, it is located on No. 3 Road but it stretches as far west as Minoru Boulevard, and as far north as Westminster Highway...
as well.
Japan
In July 2007, HMV Japan, which operates 62 shops, was sold to DSM Investment Catorce. The stores and HMV Japan website continue to trade as HMV, but is no longer owned by HMV Group.Since JVC Kenwood Holdings
JVC Kenwood Holdings
JVC Kenwood Holdings is a company formed from the merger of JVC and Kenwood Corporation on October 1st, 2008. Based in Yokohama, Kenwood Chairman Haruho Kawahara is the holding company's chairman, while JVC President Kunihiko Sato is company's president...
(thru its JVC
JVC
, usually referred to as JVC, is a Japanese international consumer and professional electronics corporation based in Yokohama, Japan which was founded in 1927...
and Victor Entertainment
Victor Entertainment
is a subsidiary of Japan Victor Company that produces and distributes music, movies and other entertainment products such as anime and television shows in Japan. It was formerly known as...
subsidiaries) controls the His Master's Voice trademark in Japan, HMV Japan uses as its trademark a stylized gramophone of its own design. As with the former U.S. & Canadian operations, HMV Japan's use of the initials "HMV" has never been challenged.
India
The first overseas branch of EMI was established in India in 1901. It went on make the first audio recording in India, of singer Gauhar Jan in 1902 and witnessed Indian cinema going talkies in 1931 leading to a boom in film based songs. The Gramophone Company of India was incorporated in 1946, and existed until 1985, when it was taken over by the RPG GroupRPG Group
The RPG Group one of India's largest industrial conglomerate headquartered in Mumbai, India. It was founded by RP Goenka in 1979, and initially encompassed Phillips Carbon Black, Asian Cables, Agarpara Jute and Murphy India...
. On 2 November 2000, the company changed its name to Sa Re Ga Ma India Ltd.
Sa Re Ga Ma
Saregama India Limited, formerly The Gramophone Company of India is an Indian music company. Saregama also works in the home video business...
. Sa Re Ga Ma controls a large repertoire of Indian film and non-film music, spanning a century.
Product range
HMV stores stock a range of products from audioMusic
Music is an art form whose medium is sound and silence. Its common elements are pitch , rhythm , dynamics, and the sonic qualities of timbre and texture...
, book
Book
A book is a set or collection of written, printed, illustrated, or blank sheets, made of hot lava, paper, parchment, or other materials, usually fastened together to hinge at one side. A single sheet within a book is called a leaf or leaflet, and each side of a leaf is called a page...
s, Blu-ray disc
Blu-ray Disc
Blu-ray Disc is an optical disc storage medium designed to supersede the DVD format. The plastic disc is 120 mm in diameter and 1.2 mm thick, the same size as DVDs and CDs. Blu-ray Discs contain 25 GB per layer, with dual layer discs being the norm for feature-length video discs...
s, CDs
Compact Disc
The Compact Disc is an optical disc used to store digital data. It was originally developed to store and playback sound recordings exclusively, but later expanded to encompass data storage , write-once audio and data storage , rewritable media , Video Compact Discs , Super Video Compact Discs ,...
, computer
Computer
A computer is a programmable machine designed to sequentially and automatically carry out a sequence of arithmetic or logical operations. The particular sequence of operations can be changed readily, allowing the computer to solve more than one kind of problem...
software and hardware
Hardware
Hardware is a general term for equipment such as keys, locks, hinges, latches, handles, wire, chains, plumbing supplies, tools, utensils, cutlery and machine parts. Household hardware is typically sold in hardware stores....
, DVDs, video games and most recently have expanded their range of clothing and fashion items through "The Studio" section of their stores.
See also
- FoppFopp (retailer)Fopp is a chain of retail stores selling music, film, books and other entertainment products in the United Kingdom.-History:From its origins as a one-man stall in Glasgow, Scotland, in 1981, it expanded to a chain of over 100 branches throughout the country in 2007...
- Ottakar'sOttakar'sOttakar's was a chain of bookshops in the United Kingdom founded in 1987 by James Heneage. Following a takeover by the HMV Group plc in 2006, the chain was merged into the Waterstone's brand.-History:...
- Waterstone'sWaterstone'sWaterstone's is a British book specialist established in 1982 by Tim Waterstone that employs around 4,500 staff throughout the United Kingdom and Europe....
- A&B SoundA&B SoundA&B Sound was a Canadian home electronics retailer based in Richmond, British Columbia. Its flagship store was located in Downtown Vancouver, and the chain expanded to other cities in B.C. and in western Canada, but the company began struggling in the 2000s decade and collapsed altogether in 2008.-...
- His Master's Voice, the trademark from which HMV got its name
- NipperNipperNipper was a dog that served as the model for a painting titled His Late Master's Voice. This image was the basis for the dog and trumpet logo used by several audio recording and associated brands: His Master's Voice, HMV, RCA, Victor Talking Machine Company, RCA Victor and JVC.- Biography :Nipper...
, the dog featured in the trademark - The Hut GroupThe Hut GroupThe Hut Group is an online retailer based in the United Kingdom. Founded in 2004 by CEO Matthew Moulding, it sells non-perishable health and beauty, entertainment, fashion, bags, footwear and gifts.-History:...