c & a. for other uses see c & a disambiguation . c & a type private industry retailing founded 1841 ; 175 years ago 1841 founder clemens and august brenninkmeijer headquarters vilvoorde belgium d sseldorf germany area served much of continental europe key people lucas brenninkmeijer chairman & ceo knut bruggemann executive thorsten rolfes executive products apparel footwear specialty revenue us 8.1 billion 2010 number of employees 40 000 parent cofra holding ag website www.c and a.com c & a store in berlin with the swiss tel berlin on the upper floors c & a store in sneek the netherlands c & a is an international dutch chain of fashion retail clothing stores with its european head offices in vilvoorde belgium and d sseldorf germany . it has retail stores in many countries in europe central america and south america . its brands include angelo litrico canda clockhouse here there palomino rodeo ski and snowboard clothes westbury yessica yessica pure and your sixth sense . contents 1 history 2 stores 2.1 americas 2.2 asia 2.3 europe 3 in popular culture 4 references 5 external links history edit the company was founded by brothers clemens and august brenninkmeijer in 1841 as a dutch textile company taking its company name from their initials . in 1906 clemen s son bernard joseph started discounting in amsterdam rekenen in centen in plaats van procenten and by 1910 there were ten stores in the netherlands . they were from the german brenninkmeyer family which traded in linen and textiles since the 17th century from its hometown of mettingen germany . 1 for many years c & a retail clothing stores were a major presence on high streets throughout the united kingdom . c & a also opened stores in a number of out of town locations most notably its store at the merry hill shopping centre in the west midlands which opened in november 1989 . the company s strategy of selling budget clothes from high rent city centre retail stores made it vulnerable to a new breed of competitors operating in cheaper out of town locations including matalan and the rapidly expanding clothing operations of supermarket food chains such as tesco and asda and to expanding high street names such as h & m zara and topshop . c & a in the united kingdom was a notable example of an incorporated private unlimited company 2 which meant that it was not required to publish its financial statements under united kingdom company law . in 2000 c & a announced its intention to withdraw from the british market where it had been operating since 1922 and the last uk retail stores closed in 2001 . 3 primark bought 11 of the c & a stores . in june 2009 the company withdrew from the argentinian market . c & a china competes with main clothing companies such as h & m and zara . the brenninkmeijer family through its company cofra holding ag located in switzerland continues to own the c & a group and the company s success has led the family to become the wealthiest in the netherlands . 4 the brenninkmeijer family however now live in geneva and zug switzerland benefiting from the taxation climate . the american singer songwriter actress and fashion model beyonc released her own clothing line der on in cooperation with c & a in the summer of 2010 . stores edit number of c & a stores on 25 february 2016 americas edit brazil 319 mexico 75 asia edit china 85 europe edit germany 486 france 169 belgium 138 netherlands 133 austria 131 spain 109 switzerland 100 poland 74 czech republic 41 hungary 38 portugal 35 romania 35 turkey 24 croatia 19 slovakia 15 serbia 14 slovenia 14 russia 11 italy 9 luxembourg 8 in popular culture edit united kingdom ska act the specials referenced the store in man at c & a on the 1980 album more specials . the phrase man at c & a was later used to typify someone who was sartorially challenged . 5 6 7 in an episode of the popular sitcom only fools and horses delboy tells his brother rodney that when they become millionaires their clothes will come from man at c & a . references edit c & a a success story . c & a. retrieved 20 december 2012 . company details c & a company number 00524665 . united kingdom companies house webcheck . retrieved 20 december 2012 . c & a quits uk . bbc news . 15 june 2000 . retrieved 20 december 2012 . brenninkmeijers still netherlands richest family . nis news . 6 november 2003 . retrieved 20 december 2012 . cope nigel 16 june 2000 . c & a a sad tale of the high street store that went from coats and ats to closure and acrimony . the independent . retrieved 20 december 2012 . c & a closes uk doors for last time . bbc news . 31 may 2001 . retrieved 20 december 2012 . man at c & a . slang dictionary.com . retrieved 20 december 2012 . external links edit wikimedia commons has media related to c & a. c & a europe company website v t e european retail round table members asda c & a carrefour delhaize group el corte ingl s h & m ikea inditex jer nimo martins kingfisher marks & spencer mercadona metro ag ahold tesco retrieved from https en.wikipedia.org w index.php title c % 26a & oldid 737203240 categories clothing brandsclothing retailersclothing brands of the netherlandsclothing companies of the netherlandscompanies established in 1841defunct retail companies of the united kingdomdutch brandscompanies based in d sseldorfvilvoordehidden categories use dmy dates from april 2014commons category with page title same as on wikidata navigation menu personal tools not logged intalkcontributionscreate accountlog in namespaces article talk variants views read edit view history more search navigation main pagecontentsfeatured contentcurrent eventsrandom articledonate to wikipediawikipedia store interaction helpabout wikipediacommunity portalrecent changescontact page tools what links hererelated changesupload filespecial pagespermanent linkpage informationwikidata itemcite this page print export create a bookdownload as pdfprintable version in other projects wikimedia commons languages e tinadanskdeutscheestiespa ol fran aisitaliano nederlandspolskiportugu srom n suomit rk e edit links this page was last modified on 1 september 2016 at 09 37 . text is available under the creative commons attribution sharealike license ; additional terms may apply . by using this site you agree to the terms of use and privacy policy . wikipedia is a registered trademark of the wikimedia foundation inc. a non profit organization . privacy policy about wikipedia disclaimers contact wikipedia developers cookie statement mobile view