Conforama

In the early 1960s, Pierre and Guy Sordoillet, Jean Moll and Jacques Ragageot, supported by furniture dealers in the north and a Bordeaux manufacturer, Charles Minvielle, created a "Carrefour of furniture" by testing a discount formula in the dependencies an old farm in the suburbs of Lyon. In 1967, a first Conforama was opened in Saint-Priest, Rhône in a 2,500-square-metre industrial building.

In 1976, Conforama was acquired by Agache-Willot.

In 1981, the financial holding company experienced serious legal difficulties, and in 1991, Conforama was acquired by Pinault SA. Conforama sets up its first commercial website in 1998.[3]

In March 2011, Conforama was sold by Kering (formerly Pinault Printemps Redoute) to Steinhoff International, for a consideration of €1.2 billion.[4][5]

A Conforama store in Wallisellen, Switzerland in April 2012

In March 2016, Darty announced it had agreed to be purchased by Steinhoff for £673 million, through Conforama subsidiary.[6][7] Fnac returned with a higher offer, resulting in a bidding war between Fnac and Conforama during April 2016.[8] On 26 April, Conforama announced that it has dropped out in the battle for Darty.[9] The Fnac offer was declared unconditional on 19 July 2016, thereby allowing the takeover to be completed.[10] In September 2016, it was reported that Conforama and Casino had forged a supply purchase co-operation agreement.[11]

In April 2017, Conforama signed title sponsorship with France's Ligue 1. The deal, reportedly worth €10 million a season, started in the 2017–18 season and ended on 2019–20.[12] The next month, Conforama announced that it would take a 17% stake in the French number two in online clearance retail site Showroomprivé.fr in the amount of €157.4 million.[13] On 11 January 2018 this stale was urgently sold off on the orders of Steinhoff, which was suffering from its own accounting scandal. The proceeds of this sale to Carrefour amounted to €79m, a loss of 50 %.[14]

Although the group had a net turnover of €3.4 billion euros in 2018, in France has accumulated losses since 2013 of close to €500 million ($564 million), according to its parent. To that end, and to address the challenges in the retail sector, the company announced the departure of Frank Deshayes, General Manager France, on 9 July 2019.[15] A major restructuring plan for 2020 that was announced in July 2019 involved the closure of 32 stores – including the chain's flagship store in Pont Neuf – and the loss of 1,900 jobs.[16][17]

In late September 2019, Conforama named Marc Ténart as the new General Manager of the group.[18] Marc Ténart had formerly headed Kingfisher, the holding company of Castorama.[19][20]

In July 2020 Austrian furniture retailer XXXLutz Group acquires the 162 French branches of Conforama, through its French subsidiary BUT.[21]