Radio Rentals
of Bentinck Street, London.
1930 Company founded by Percy Perring-Thoms, a radio dealer in Brighton who was one of the first to foresee the potential market for renting of radio sets.
1936 Public company. About 50,000 rental customers.
1945 Acquired Mains Radio Gramophone Ltd, a manufacturing company in Yorkshire, in order to ensure the supply of radio set
1953 Manufacturer of TV sets [1]
1960 Acquired the Baird Company. Radio Rentals changed the name of its manufacturing subsidiary in Bradford, Mains Radio Gramophone, to Baird Television, to emphasise its position in the manufacturing of televisions.[2].
1961 Manufacturers, designers, repairers and renters of television, radio and radiogramophones. 4,500 employees. [3]
1962 Acquired Recordacall, renter of telephone answering equipment; the equipment was now being made by Baird Television. The group was developing the business of renting the telephone answering equipment. Acquired Dawes Radio Group.[4]
1964 Merger of 2 leading rental chains, Radio Rentals and Rentaset Ltd. Mr. J. W. C. Robinson became chairman of Radio Rentals
1966 Radio Rentals group acquired the three year old Vista Rentals company.
1968 Thorn Electrical Industries made take-over bid for Radio Rentals. At the time, Radio Rentals manufacturing divisions included Goodmans Loudspeakers Ltd, Metal Developments, Monk Metal Windows and Baird Television and Telerection.
1978 Thorn Television Rentals was one of 6 television rental companies examined by the Price Commission; it was one of 2 companies singled out as having a high degree of profitability and subject of a recommendation for a price freeze. The company traded under the names: Radio Rentals, Domestic Electric Rentals (DER) and Multibroadcast[5]
1998 Radio Rentals, with 2200 shops in 20 countries (585 in the UK), was the main activity of Thorn when it was acquired by Nomura[6]
See Also
Sources of Information
- Competition Commission report [1]