[15][16] In January 2024, Woolworth Deutschland's chief executive told BBC News that the UK was on his "bucket list" of destinations for international expansion.

[21] After the idea for the creation of the British business, Frank Woolworth had offered invitations to shope managers in the United States to establish shops in the UK and had only received offers to take positions at the time of his illness in March 1909 from Fred Woolworth of the Sixth Avenue and Samuel Balfour of the 14th Street shops in New York City.

However, Carson C. Peck, vice president and general manager of the company, had reservations with enlisting staff members to travel to Britain, questioning whether Woolworth had indeed created the new business adventure following a dream, or due to his dissatisfaction with the current condition of the American branch.

[24] Peck also asked those who were willing to volunteer to reconsider their decision, claiming that those who had volunteered were unaware of the uncertainty and risks involved and that some were only tentatively willing to engage in Woolworth's new endeavour:[25] His concerns mainly centred on the fact that the majority of the managers who followed the decision did so out of loyalty to Woolworth,[26] and that moving such a valuable resource already established in the United States to what was a financially unproven "Little Infant" in the UK would have a detrimental effect upon the "Bread and Butter" of the Company.

[29] Despite local press praise, British national newspaper the Daily Mail likened Frank Woolworth to American showman P. T. Barnum and claimed that the location had been decided as part of a contingency plan in the event of failure so as to facilitate escape from any financial liability.

Woolworths Group plc was formed by the demerger of Kingfisher's general merchandise business,[43] and began trading as a listed company on the London Stock Exchange on 28 August 2003, using the symbol WLW.

Although it was successful at the beginning, the format failed to catch on; the original plan had relied upon leveraging the involvement of other Kingfisher group retailers, but following the de-merger this was no longer possible.

Woolworths had a strongly unionised workforce, with shop stewards such as Paul Thompson of Unite (formerly the Transport and General Workers' Union) particularly active in the north of the UK.

At the same time, Johnson outlined a possible turnaround plan to sell 120 shops, axe a quarter of its products, reduce web operations and cut jobs.

On 26 November 2008, the trading of shares in Woolworths PLC was suspended, and Neville Kahn, Dan Butters and Nick Dargan of Deloitte were appointed joint administrators.

The administrators announced that they were aiming to keep the company as a going concern over the crucial Christmas period, although analysts feared that any heavy discounting would create a domino effect and drag down other high street retailers.

[65] On 5 December 2008, Woolworths recorded their greatest single day takings of £27 million, and axed 450 head office and support staff jobs.

[73] The trade unions complained of the collective redundancies and they started various legal actions before the UK tribunals based on the absence of proper consultation of the employee representatives.

[77] The stunt was perpetrated by a teenage student, Luke Castle, who claimed to have run it as an experiment "testing the brand loyalty of the British public".

Talks were still progressing to sell individual shops and leases to a number of retailers, said to include the supermarket chains Morrisons, Tesco, Asda, Sainsbury's, The Co-operative Group and Poundland.

[81] In December 2008, Woolworths executive Tony Page and former UBS banker Gareth Thomas were trying to raise around £30,000,000 to relaunch the brand after closure with a chain of 125 shops.

[96] According to press reports on 17 February 2009, Tony Page and Gareth Thomas were planning to open a chain of shops adopting the Woolworths format, but under a different name.

Many branches of Woolworths suffered severe bomb damage and even destruction during the Luftwaffe attacks in the early part of the Second World War.

However it was towards the end of the war that the largest civilian loss of life due to direct enemy fire in Britain during the conflict occurred when, at lunchtime on 25[106] November 1944, a German V-2 rocket fell on a packed Woolworths shop in New Cross Road, killing 168 people (including 15 children), injuring 122 others and razing the building to the ground.

The site was split into three sections, along with an administration block that housed the company’s new mainframe computer system and all stock and accounting records.

The fire soon spread owing to the failure of the sprinkler system; this led to administration staff frantically dis-assembling the computer and passing parts of it, along with stock cards and other records, out of windows onto waiting lorries.

[108][109] A fire erupted just after 1pm on 8 May 1979 at the Manchester shop opposite Piccadilly Gardens, said at the time to be the largest Woolworths in Europe, with six floors plus two basement levels.

The fire, which started in the second floor furnishing department, killed nine shoppers and one member of staff,[110] of whom three were found just six feet away from an exit with another three bodies nearby.

However, there is still no legal requirement for United Kingdom retailers to have a sprinkler system in place, with many preferring to focus on evacuation procedures rather than fire containment.

The disaster has become a significant object of study for academics interested in the behaviour of people in emergency situations, after research showed a number of customers (predominately in the public restaurant area) refused to leave despite the sounding of alarms, requests from staff and even the smell and visibility of smoke; some even continued to queue at an abandoned check-out.

[108] As a result of the damage caused to the reputation of the business by these events, the American parent owners decided to sell the British operation to Paternoster Stores, which was eventually renamed Kingfisher.

[108] As a result of the targeting of high-profile British businesses in Northern Ireland by the Irish Republican Army (IRA) during The Troubles, a number of Woolworth shops suffered significant damage.

The Bognor Regis incident prompted a security alert along the south coast seaside resorts and the Brighton bike bomb was subsequently located.

Immediate and successful efforts were made by the police to evacuate the commercial centre of the town, however there was inadequate time to prevent the devices from exploding.

Additionally, minor structural damage was caused to the shop's storeroom with two internal portioning walls adjacent to the generator room and fixtures having to be rebuilt.