Boots – The UK Chemist Shop

John Boot was born in Radcliffe on Trent Nottinghamshire in 1815. He spent his early years as a farm worker. Until illness forced him to change career direction. Mr John Boot opens his first herbalist shop in Goose gate Nottingham in 1849. He provided an affordable alternative to the normal medicines of the day. The shop sold herbal remedies his mother made. He was not a trained chemist but learned the trade later and as he went along. This was the basis of Boots the Chemists we all know of today throughout the world. The career change did not improve his health and he died in 1860. He was survived by his wife Mary and two children Jesse and Jane. Jesse Boot at a very young age helped his mum run the family shop M & J Boot, Herbalists in Goose gate. Daily chores included collecting the herbs, roots and flowers for drying and treating at the back of the store. In 1877 Jesse took ownership of the business this is when trade really started to boom. He used inventive advertising campaigns. These ranged from street bell ringers spreading the message of cheaper medicines than his rivals to advertising slogans like ‘health for a shilling’. Determined to grow the business Jesse bought wholesale medicines he could sell through the growing store chain. He later started to manufacture medicines on a small scale in the back of the main store now named Boot and Co. Ltd. The business flourished but Just like his dad he suffered ill health. He went for a rest in Jersey where he met his future wife much to the consternation of his mother. Jesse Boot and Florence Rowe were married in 1886.

Recent Boots History

The company was renamed to Boots Pure Drug Company Ltd in 1888. By 1914, Boots the Chemist had 550 branches across the country and was continuing to grow. Jesse Boot was instrumental in transforming the company founded by his father into the retailer we recognise now. The majority shareholding of Boots the “Chemists to the Nation” was sold to American investors (United Drug Company of American) in 1920. In 1933 Boots came back into British ownership after difficult times in the states with The Great Depression. They have had many mergers and diversification over the years. The Boots Company merged with Alliance UniChem in 2006 to create Alliance Boots. In 2012, Walgreens purchased a 45% stake in Alliance Boots and in 2014 completed the acquisition and Boots became a subsidiary of the new company, Walgreens Boots Alliance in 2014. This was a bringing together of two like minded companies.  Both with shared values and trusted healthcare and pharmaceutical wholesaling care.