Texas Homecare was established in 1972, by Manny, Sydney and Gerald Fogel, who had previously founded the high street specialist paint and wallpaper chain Home Charm. Taking their lead from America, they revolutionised the market of DIY in the United Kingdom, with the introduction of the 'DIY Shed' style outlet. Mervyn Fogel, co founder and managing director for over twenty five years, had a vision of turning the small family business into a retail empire for DIY. Texas specialised in higher volume, lower margin DIY products. The company had been adversely affected by a recession and depressed housing market. In 1986, Ladbrokes officially acquired the chain, which they sold within nine years.
Acquisition
In January 1995, Ladbrokes put the firm up for sale. Later in the month, Sainsbury's bought out Texas Homecare, and with its acquisition, Homebase hoped to hold around 10% of the total DIY market in the United Kingdom. In May 1995, however, it was announced that only twenty six stores of Texas were to close, with limited redundancies. Sainsbury's found that full conversion to the Homebase format was an investment worth making, and allowed £50 million for the task. By the time of the purchase, Texas had staff totaling 11,600, and Homebase had 4,500. These stores were rebranded, and redesigned to the Homebase format, the first to be converted being in Longwell Green, Bristol in February 1996. A few other stores were sold off to other retailers; including the store in Merry Hill in the West Midlands, which closed in 1995, which was then split between PC World and Currys. The last sixty stores of Texas Homecare were converted to Homebase in 1999, and the name Texas vanished from high streets, shopping malls and retail parks. In August 2000, the former chief executive of Texas Homecare, Ron Trenter, made an unprecedented bid for Homebase, which was sold off within four months.
Advertising
In its early years, Texas was famous for its television advertising slogan: Texas — THE BIG ONE!. In later years, Texas used a fictional character, named Texas Tom in its advertising. During the beginning of the 1990s, this campaign was altered slightly to refer toTom's Place: Only at Tom's place!.
