A Very British Revolution

John Lewis is one of the UK’s leading brands and is part and parcel of the lives of millions of people across Britain. These special qualities stem from the remarkable vision of John Spedan Lewis who inherited a clutch of successful Victorian department stores and transformed them into a revolutionary, employee-owned business. This book, the first to trace the 150-year history of John Lewis, highlights the company’s radical organisation, its innovative approach to retailing, and the unique way that it treats both staff and customers. With unrivalled access to the John Lewis Partnership’s own substantial archive of photography and ephemera, A Very British Revolution: 150 Years of John Lewis shows how the history of the company mirrors that of Britain as a whole and traces the emerging consumerism of the Victorian world, through the social upheavals of the twentieth century into the globalized world of retail today.