Northern Upholstery In 1969, aged 22, Graham Kirkham was married with two children, which he describes as great motivation. Having visited a few manufacturers in his daily work, he decided that making furniture was relatively easy and that by cutting out the warehouse dealers in the middle of the supply chain, he could sell direct to the public at lower prices. Kirkham rented a room above a
snooker hall in
Carcroft, and started making furniture upstairs and retailing it downstairs, calling the business Northern Upholstery. Northern Upholstery was renamed DFS (although some branches of Northern Upholstery in Yorkshire retained their original name until the mid-1990s) and at the time, had a total of sixty three stores, employing 2,000 staff. This brought the Kirkham family to the attention of thieves, who in 1994, broke into the family home at
Sprotbrough while they were on holiday. The burglars bound and gagged the housekeeper and made off with money and jewels worth £2.4 million, later recovered, but still South Yorkshire's largest armed robbery. in an eventual £496 million deal. DFS acquired the furniture businesses of
Wyefield Group for £1.5 million in June 1999. Kirkham told the
Yorkshire Post: "It's something that's caused me fitful sleep in the time I've been thinking about it. I've no hobby, this is my hobby – it's what I do. I'm an entrepreneur. It's almost as if I can feel the adrenaline running through my veins." On 3 April 2010, it was announced that DFS had been sold to private equity firm
Advent International for a reported £500 million. DFS then acquired its smaller rival, Sofa Workshop, in November 2013. The company went on to buy
Dwell, another competitor which was struggling in the market, in August 2014. On 6 March 2015, the company floated on the
London Stock Exchange again as DFS Furniture plc. In October 2017, DFS announced they had purchased one of its competitors,
Sofology (formerly Sofaworks and CSL) in a £25 million deal. The acquisition was ratified by the
Competition and Markets Authority in November 2017. As of 2024, DFS has ceased trading in Spain. == Marketing ==