Mothercare

The company was founded by Selim Zilkha and Sir James Goldsmith in 1961. It was first listed on the London Stock Exchange in 1972.

In 1982, the company merged with Habitat to form Habitat Mothercare plc. In 1986, Habitat Mothercare plc merged with British Home Stores, to form Storehouse plc. In January 1996, it bought Children's World from Boots, and rebranded these stores as Mothercare World. In May 2000, the Bhs stores were sold to Philip Green, and Storehouse reverted to the Mothercare brand.

In June 2007, Mothercare bought Early Learning Centre (ELC) for £85 million. In October 2007, it launched Gurgle, a pregnancy and parenting social networking website. In November 2009, Mothercare acquired the 50% of Gurgle that it did not already own.

In July 2010, Mothercare bought the trademark and brand of Blooming Marvellous, a privately owned rival.

In May 2018, it was confirmed that Mothercare would close 50 stores in the United Kingdom under company voluntary arrangement schemes affecting three subsidiaries: Mothercare UK Limited, Early Learning Centre Limited and Childrens World Limited. The Early Learning Centre business – which operated in 80 UK stores and 400 overseas franchises – was sold to the Entertainer group in March 2019.

During the 2019 financial year, the company's Watford headquarters was sold in a leaseback transaction which raised £14.5M. In July 2019, the company said it was planning to spin off its UK retail business due to decreased sales. The company reported that UK store sales had fallen by 23.2%, while online sales in the UK were down by 12.1%. The company recorded a worldwide sales drop of 9.4%.

In November 2019, the company put Mothercare UK (and Mothercare Business Services) into administration; all the UK shops and the UK website closed soon after.

The company's shares are traded in London on AIM. In October 2024, Mothercare restructured its operations in South Asia in a joint venture with Reliance Brands.

The company operated online, on high streets and in out-of-town retail parks. In November 2009 it had over 1,060 stores worldwide, of which 389 were in the United Kingdom, and 671 were in 38 other countries.

In January 2019, Mothercare announced that its store closure programme was ahead of schedule and the group was on course to have 79 shops by the end of March 2019.

Following the closure of the UK business, from mid-2020 some Mothercare-branded products were to be sold by Boots, both online and in stores.

Controversy

The British retailer Poundland planned to open a store in Biggleswade, dubbed "Motherland", with a logo similar to Mothercare's. In February 2023, after Mothercare sent a cease and desist to the discount retailer, the store was renamed to "Parentland" and the logo was changed to the same font as the Poundland logo.