The history of the raincoat

NEXT

The highstreet store NEXT has an ambivalent part to play in the history of rainwear. It still sells showerproof fashion coats, but it grew out of one of the most important UK retailers of the real thing, and that particular product line was an early casualty of the Next thing.

The Next thing was a big thing. Next revolutionised the retailing of clothing in the UK in the 1980s. It introduced the idea of clothing being designed as well as sold by the retailer, who gave it their brand label too. And the stores created a different ambiance from the one offered by the ancien régime, represented for example by the 'gentleman's tailors' J Hepworth & Son which had set the tone for clothing retail for some decades. In contrast, customers in a Next flagship store in Edinburgh in the early 80s had the opportunity to recover from the exhaustion of shopping over a cup of coffee in-store.

Hepworth's was in fact the firm which drove the new thinking. It was founded in Leeds in 1864, an impeccable provenance on both counts, but in the 1970s, after decades of expansion (it went public in 1948), Hepworth's was becoming aware of the need to refresh its appeal. The person in the chair - the chair of the Hepworth Board - was Terance Conran, and he launched his plan for a new look and feel by acquiring (in 1981) a chain specialising in women's clothing called Kendalls.

The person appointed to apply the idea (as a new Conran appointed Chief Executive) was George Davies, the Davies who later moved on to develop the clothing retailing of Asda, and then his own chain of outlets, George.

Kendalls had some 80 stores across the UK. It was these stores that were given the new personality implant. They became the first tranch of Next outlets. The Hepworth stores themselves received the makeover shortly afterwards, offering Next for Men.

The Hepworth business had become Next in all but name: the name changed in 1986, the technical birthday of Next plc.

The mail order catalogue business Grattan was an early acquisition by the new firm, and Next Directory launched in 1988. Acquisitions and diversification then multiplied: and proved disastrous. Plunging profits, turning negative in 1989, prompted a reverse process of selling off and getting rid, George Davies himself among those dispensed with. Acquisitions and sellings off have alternated since.

Refs

NEXT website (accessed 20:06:08) offers a history which includes that of Kendalls too. Wikipedia entry for NEXT (accessed 20:06:08) is valuable too.

I take the infomation above from the Encyclopedia of Company Histories (accessed 20:06:08).

Scholarly Studies include:

Huygen, Frédérique, British Design: Image & Identity, London, 1989.

Wilson, Elizabeth, and Lou Taylor, Through the Looking Glass: A History of Dress from 1860 to the Present Day, London, 1989.

George Davies also has a memoire:

Davies, George, What Next?, London, 1989.

SHOP | CLUB FOYER | CHILLOUT ROOM | ASK LORRAINE