Harrods Department Store
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| Private company | |
| Industry | Retail |
| Genre | Department store |
| Founded | 1834 |
| Founder | Charles Henry Harrod |
| Headquarters |
London, SW3 United Kingdom |
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Key people
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H.E. Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim bin Jaber Al Thani H.E. Sheikh Abdullah bin Mohammed bin Saud Al Thani H.E. Hussain Al Abdulla Michael A. Ward John P. Edgar |
| Products | Quality and luxury goods |
| Revenue |
 £769 million (2015)
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|
£126 million (2015)
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| Owner | Qatar Holdings |
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Number of employees
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12,000 (2013)
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| Subsidiaries | |
| Website | www |
Harrods is a luxury department store located on Brompton Road in Knightsbridge, London. It is owned by the state of Qatar. The Harrods brand also applies to other enterprises undertaken by the Harrods group of companies including Harrods Bank, Harrods Estates, Harrods Aviation and Air Harrods, and to Harrods Buenos Aires, sold by Harrods in 1922 and closed as of 2011[update], with plans announced to reopen in 2013.
The store occupies a 5-acre (20,000 m2) site and has 330 departments covering one million square feet (90,000 m2) of retail space.
The Harrods motto is Omnia Omnibus Ubique, which is Latin for "all things for all people, everywhere". Several of its departments, including the seasonal Christmas department and the food halls, are well known.
In 1824, at the age of 25, Charles Henry Harrod established a business at 228 Borough High Street in Southwark. He ran this business, variously listed as a draper, mercer, and a haberdasher, until 1831 at least. During 1825, the business was listed as 'Harrod and Wicking, Linen Drapers, Retail', but this partnership was dissolved at the end of that year. His first grocery business appears to be as ‘Harrod & Co.Grocers’ at 163 Upper Whitecross Street, Clerkenwell, E.C.1., in 1832.
In 1834 in London's East End, he established a wholesale grocery in Stepney, at 4, Cable Street, with a special interest in tea. In 1849, to escape the vice of the inner city and to capitalise on trade to the Great Exhibition of 1851 in nearby Hyde Park, Harrod took over a small shop in the district of Brompton, on the site of the current store. Beginning in a single room employing two assistants and a messenger boy, Harrod's son Charles Digby Harrod built the business into a thriving retail operation selling medicines, perfumes, stationery, fruits and vegetables. Harrods rapidly expanded, acquired the adjoining buildings, and employed one hundred people by 1880.
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Wikipedia