Guthrie Bowron

Guthrie Bowron is a franchise of New Zealand home improvement stores established in 1896. It sells a range of home decorating supplies, including paint, wallpaper, flooring, curtains and blinds.

There are 51 Guthrie Bowron stores around New Zealand, including five in Auckland.

The Guthrie Brown company was established in 1896 in Dunedin man Henry Guthrie. George Bowron later came on as a business partner, and the pair travelled around the South Island selling a range of products.

In the mid-1920s, the company started importing what were the base ingredients for paint at the time: lacquer, varnish, lead and linseed oil.

In 1932, the company became an agent for Dulux Paints; it opened a wallpaper store in Christchurch a short time later.

Guthrie Bowron became a publicly listed company in 1963.

By 1969, it had 18 branches around the country selling a range of paint and wallpaper.

In 1971, Guthrie Bowron was purchased by ICI NZ, the owner and manufacturer of Dulux Paints.