In 1977, a former Staedtler pencil factory on the outskirts of Llantrisant was swept clean of lead dust by a team of family members. The family member leading the venture was Gerald Leeke and the purchase of the factory would become one of the most forward-thinking retail ventures in British history. He didn’t know it at the time – none of them did – but they were building something that would change the way Britain shops.
Gerald Leeke joined the family business full-time in the late 1960s, stepping into an ironmongery and builders’ merchant that his grandfather James Henry Leeke had started from the front room of a terraced house in Tonypandy back in 1897. The business had survived two World Wars, the decline of the coal industry, and every economic headwind South Wales could throw at it – but Gerald had bigger ambitions.
Under his leadership, company turnover surged from £38,000 in 1965 to £500,000 by 1975. Gerald Leeke moved from Tonypandy high street to the old railway yard to enable him to extend the categories stocked, adding kitchen and bathroom showrooms. The high street was no longer enough.
In 1977, Gerald opened Leekes’ first out-of-town superstore in Talbot Green near Llantrisant, repurposing a former factory into a comprehensive home department store offering building & decorating materials alongside kitchens, bathrooms and flooring. It was a genuinely radical idea. At a time when British retail was anchored to the high street, Gerald had the conviction – and the courage – to go where the space was, where parking was plentiful, and where customers could be offered something they had never experienced before: everything for the home, under one enormous roof.
Leekes became one of the UK’s first out-of-town department stores. The national chains would follow. From B&Q to IKEA – the entire out-of-town retail park model that millions of British families now take for granted on a Saturday morning – owes a debt, whether acknowledged or not, to the kind of thinking Gerald embodied.
During the 1980s UK recessions, Leekes demonstrated resilience by diversifying product ranges and strategically locating new outlets – in 1984 opening its Cross Hands store in Carmarthenshire, marketed as an out-of-town department store with added features like a comprehensive furniture studio, garden centre and restaurant – achieving annual profits of £4 million by the early part of the decade despite economic pressures in traditional South Wales industries.
This wasn’t luck. It was Gerald’s instinct that the best time to invest is precisely when others are pulling back.
Gerald Leeke was awarded the OBE for his services to the retail and leisure industries, and to sport and the community in South Wales. Receiving that honour, he was characteristically generous in his response – crediting his family and his loyal team above himself.
That generosity of spirit is perhaps as much a part of his legacy as the stores he built.
Today, the Leekes Retail & Leisure Group operates major department stores at Llantrisant, Cross Hands and Melksham as well as a furniture and kitchen store in Cheltenham alongside Park Furnishers in Bristol, the Vale Resort, Hensol Castle, and Hensol Castle Distillery and retains its Builders Merchant in Tonypandy, where it all began. The stores are strategically located around 45 minutes to an hour apart, because Leekes recognised early that customers are willing to drive for the range and scale on offer. That insight is pure Gerald.
The fourth generation of the Leeke family now leads the business. Emma Leeke serves as Managing Director of Leekes Retail supported by sister Jo as the Retail Buying Director. Brother Stephen leads the Vale Resort and brother Chris operates Hensol Castle Distillery and runs their property interests. The values – family, community, quality, and the courage to think differently – remain exactly as Gerald shaped them.
From a pencil factory floor covered in lead dust to Wales’ most celebrated retail and leisure groups, the Leekes story is, at its heart, the story of one man’s vision that the future of retail lay beyond the high street.
Gerald Leeke was right. And we are proud to carry that forward.
The Leekes blog is full of lifestyle advice, the latest trends and home inspiration and it’s where you can discover our latest news about events in store. Read more here.
Keep up to date with our latest news and events on socials too with Facebook, Instagram and X.
Posted by Leekes on June 18, 2026 in News & Events
