Selfridges sold to Thai, Austrian consortium in £4bn deal

UK luxury department store Selfridges has been sold to a Thai retailer and Austrian property company for around £4bn.

Thailand’s Central Group and Austria’s Signa Holding already jointly own major department stores in Italy, Germany and Denmark. Reports said they fought off rival bids from the Qatar Investment Authority, which owns Harrods, and Lane Crawford, a Hong Kong-based department store owner.

The deal with Canada’s Weston family – which bought the iconic chain for £628m in 2002 – includes Selfridges’ four UK store as well as Brown Thomas and Arnotts in Ireland and De Bijenkorf in the Netherlands.

It also covers around £2bn of property assets, including the freehold of its listed Oxford Street flagship store in London.

The current combined Central and Signa portfolio of luxury department stores owns Rinascente in Italy, Illum in Denmark, Globus in Switzerland and The KaDeWe Group, which operates in Germany and Austria (from 2024).

Pro-forma annual turnover for the combined department stores portfolio was €5bn in 2019 and is projected to grow to more than €7bn by 2024.

The investment is significant at a time when retail department store chains feel the pressure from online upstarts such as Boohoo and the Covid pandemic, forcing them to close outlets.

High rents and business rates have also led many to resize. Notable departures in the last 12 months include Debenhams, the department store chain which collapsed last year, leading to the closure of more than 120 high street outlets.

John Lewis has closed 16 stores in the past two years, while House of Fraser shuttered 17 outlets since 2018 when it was bought out of administration by Sports Direct boss Mike Ashley. Its flagship store on Oxford Street is to close in January, and its Swindon site also recently closed.