It was listed on the London Stock Exchange and was a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index until it was acquired by Granada in 1996.

After the Second World War, his company became Forte Holdings Ltd, and bought The Café Royal in 1954.

Forte opened the first full motorway service station for cars at Newport Pagnell in 1960.

As well as The Café Royal, it also owned the Grosvenor House Hotel, Quaglino's and Talk of the Town in London.

[5] It also included the Little Chef roadside restaurants, Forte Grand, Travelodge, Posthouse and Crest hotels, Harvester restaurants, contract catering firm Gardner Merchant, the Summerland leisure complex on the Isle of Man, the wine merchant Grierson-Blumenthal, sporting goods retailer Lillywhites (which adjoined the group's Criterion Restaurant) and a majority (although non-controlling) stake in the Savoy Hotel.

[5][6] Happy Eater and the five Welcome Break service areas were bought from Hanson Trust on 1 August 1986.

[2] The group for a time started to resemble a conglomerate with interests spanning the Sidgwick & Jackson publishing house, the Terry's chocolate company, Puritan Maid and a stake in Thomas Cook travel agents.

[2] In the early 1990s, the company was rebranded as Forte and the crown logo was adopted at the same time.

This rebranding also heralded the introduction of sub brand groups for almost all the hotels (Posthouse, Crest, Heritage, Grand etc.).

Ultimately, Granada succeeded with a £3.9 billion tender offer in January 1996, which left the family with around £350 million in cash.

The hotels were originally sited alongside the group's Little Chef roadside cafes.

The office building which was the former Forte Group corporate headquarters at 166 High Holborn, London, has, many years after the Forte Group was taken over and broken up, been turned into a Travelodge (the chain having expanded to comprise a much larger number of urban hotels).

The top tier of London hotels were already part of the Exclusive group which had existed long before the early 90s reorganisation/rebranding.