What Every Woman Wants (retail chain)
| Industry | Retail |
|---|---|
| Fate | Merged |
| Founded | 1972 |
| Defunct | 1994 |
| Headquarters | Glasgow, Scotland, UK |
What Every Woman Wants (sometimes abbreviated to WEWW, and later styled as What Everyone Wants) was a British chain of discount stores. It was founded in Glasgow in 1972 by Gerald and Vera Weisfeld, and became a national chain in 1990 after being sold by the Weisfelds for £50 million to Brown & Jackson.[1] Now under the same stable as rival discounter Poundstretcher, the brand eventually disappeared from the British high street by 1995 in favour of the Poundstretcher and Your More Store brands.
The Weisfelds founded a new, eponymously named discount department store in their native Glasgow in 1994 within the old Goldbergs buildings (Goldbergs having closed in 1990), with a similar style and range of merchandise to their original WEWW business. However, the venture failed to repeat the success of the original and closed in 1999; the buildings eventually fell into dereliction and were purchased by Selfridges, whom have longer term aspirations to open on the site.
What Everyone Wants
| Industry | Retail |
|---|---|
| Fate | Administration |
| Founded | 1990 |
| Defunct | 2003 |
| Headquarters | Glasgow, Scotland, United Kingdom |
What Everyone Wants was a Scottish chain of discount stores. It was founded in Glasgow during the 1970s as What Every Woman Wants by Gerald and Vera Weisfeld. The firm became a national chain in 1990, after being sold by the Weisfelds for £50M to Brown & Jackson.[2] The 130–store business was sold to Tradegro in November 2002, but went into administration a month later.[3] They eventually closed all stores during February 2003, after officially going bankrupt the previous month. Some stores were soon converted to Poundstretcher. Many stores were co–located with Brunswick Shoes.
Over 130 stores were opened in Britain, in towns such as; Blackburn, Leyland, Ormskirk, Hartlepool & Swansea. Planned openings for What Everyone Wants & Brunswick Shoes in Accrington were planned, but never commenced. Their television commercials used the hook from 1979 Status Quo song "Whatever You Want".