[2] Louis Cohen took over the business after Lewis's death in 1885, and oversaw a period of consolidation.

Lewis's took over the Royal Welsh Warehouse—the company that started large-scale mail order[3]—in 1938.

The company responded to the Anschluss with a total boycott of goods imported from Nazi Germany, despite pressure from the pro-appeasement National Government of Neville Chamberlain.

In 1966, the group launched Miss Selfridge fashions, which later became a store chain in its own right.

After it closed in 1993, building work was undertaken to remove some of the upper floors and the redeveloped site housed a Mecca bingo hall, with part of the ground floor space being subsequently occupied by Woolworths Group, and later by Poundland, Harry Ramsden's and a variety of smaller retail units.

The company's Manchester store was one of several targets attacked by the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) on 27 January 1975.

[7] A staple of Liverpool's festive season, many generations first visited Father Christmas here, with the final displays covering over 10,000 square feet (930 m2).

The company went into administration in 1991 as a result of a combination of problems, including the early 1990s recession and failing to compete effectively.

After the 1996 Manchester bombing by the IRA, trading space in Lewis's was rented to Marks & Spencer and other smaller retailers displaced following heavy damage to the Corn Exchange.

In a final attempt to arrest the decline, the remainder-clothing retailer TK Maxx was invited to trade from the basement floor.

[8] On 23 March 2007, it was sold as a going concern to Vergo Retail Ltd., enabling the store to continue to trade as Lewis's.

Martins Bank Archive maintains a Lewis's Bank staff database covering the nine years, and family tree researchers can enquire about new entrants, transferred and/or promoted staff, marriages, retirements and deaths.