All About HMV
HMV UK and Ireland
HMV is the UK and Ireland's leading specialist retailer of Music, DVD/Video, Computer Games and Related Products.
The company operates around 200 stores in key shopping locations nationwide, equating to over 1million sq. ft. of trading space, as well as a successful online store at www.hmv.co.uk, operated by HMV Guernsey.
HMV's very first store was officially opened in July 1921 by the celebrated British composer, Sir Edward Elgar on London's Oxford Street. Since that time, the chain has become symbolised throughout the world by its iconic 'His Master's Voice' dog and trumpet trademark.
HMV is dedicated to offering its customers authoritative access to the widest possible range of recorded Music titles, DVD's and Computer Games across all formats. At 50,000 square feet, HMV 150 Oxford Street is the company's flagship and is the largest music and home entertainment store in the country, offering a choice of over 150,000 Music titles on CD and vinyl as well as comprehensive selections of DVD and Games titles.
HMV is part of HMV Group plc, which as of April 2004 operated 366 HMV stores in eight countries across Europe, North America and Pacific Asia as well as 193 Waterstone’s stores principally in the UK and Ireland. All of the Group's operations, both in the United Kingdom and internationally, are wholly owned.
The Group was listed on the London Stock Exchange on 15 May 2002, having been formed in March 1998 through the acquisition of Waterstone's from WH Smith Group plc and HMV and Dillons from EMI Group plc.
For a more detailed history and more information about HMV please click on the link on the left.
Additional Information about HMV
HMV UK and Ireland
The story of HMV as a retail brand really began in July 1921, when the acclaimed British composer, Sir Edward Elgar, officially opened the HMV store at 363 Oxford Street. The launch signalled a transforming moment in popular culture, not least because the new store was the first to catch the burgeoning demand for recorded music.
HMV pre-empted trends in retailing; the store, which featured state-of-the-art interior design and merchandising, was lavish entertainment itself, embellished by 'the most striking illuminated electric motion sign yet seen in London'. All this was innovative at the time, something, which would establish the bedrock of HMV's rich heritage.
No other record retailer can claim such a significant role in shaping the way music progressed from the concert hall to the home. The move came just in time for the rock 'n' roll explosion, which, by the following decade, was absolutely central to the new youth culture. Indeed, one chance meeting at the Oxford Street store - on 8 May, 1962 - played a key role in deciding the direction of popular music: When Beatles manager, Brian Epstein, visited the store to have more demo tapes made up in its recording studio, it was one of the HMV technicians, Jim Foy, who, on hearing the songs, alerted EMI's George Martin, the Beatles' legendary producer; the rest, as they say, became history.
During these early, pioneering years, the HMV brand became synonymous with music retailing, and the company was able to expand outside of its London base to gradually open stores all around the country. The first major period of growth came in the sixties, when fifteen new stores were opened in Greater London and the South East, and then again in the seventies, when a further twenty outlets were opened around the rest of the UK.
Since then, the trend has been for HMV to steadily open some ten new stores each year; sizes have generally been getting larger to accommodate the vast range that HMV is known for stocking, while the advent of video and, more recently, computer games, has only served to enhance the demand for increased trading space. In October 1998, this process culminated in the opening of HMV's new 50,000 sq feet flagship store at 150 Oxford Street, listed by The Guinness Book of Records at the time as the world's largest record store.
In the 1980s and 1990s HMV continued to build on the momentum it had created for itself, and flagship-standard superstores were launched in all major population centres around the UK, including in Glasgow, Edinburgh, Newcastle, Liverpool, Manchester, Leeds, Birmingham and Southampton. The UK-based chain was also able to successfully export the brand around the rest of the world, and chains were established in eight other territories, principally in North America and South East Asia.
HMV continues to lead the way in music retailing into the new millennium, and the launch in 1992 of HMV Direct, its mail order operation, and of its own web site (www.hmv.co.uk) in 1997, underlines its commitment to the new technologies and to embracing the opportunities that lie ahead
