by Gary Hoover | Mar 8, 2019 | Articles, Retailing
Originally Published on Hooversworld.com on May 22, 2018 Who would have guessed that a medium-sized retailer which never put its name on a store would evolve to become the 7th largest company in America, a place where millions of Americans shop every day? My first job...
by Gary Hoover | Sep 28, 2018 | Articles, Retailing
This article first appeared on October 11, 2017 on Hooversworld.com. “Far greater it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered with failure…than to rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy nor suffer much, because they live...
by Gary Hoover | Sep 28, 2018 | Retailing, Videos
by Gary Hoover | Sep 27, 2018 | Data, Retailing
Here is a list of the largest US discount store chains in 1968. Note that K Mart, Target, and Walmart were all founded in 1962, six years earlier. However, Walmart was not nearly big enough to make this list! Source: Discount Merchandiser Magazine, June 1969...
by Gary Hoover | Sep 27, 2018 | Data, Retailing
Here are the data slides from our video on the history of this industry. Retail History Data (PDF)
by Gary Hoover | Sep 27, 2018 | Data, Retailing
This spreadsheet contains extensive data on the largest US publicly-held retailers in 1929, 1955, 1985, and 2015. Source: Compiled by Gary Hoover from Fortune magazine lists of the biggest retailers in 1955, 1985, and 2015, and from the 1930 Moody’s Industrial Manual....
by Gary Hoover | Aug 22, 2018 | Articles, Retailing
This article first appeared on August 22, 2018 in The Archbridge Institute’s ‘American Originals’ series. Before there was Amazon, there was Sears, Roebuck, using the mail-order catalog where the Internet is used today. Before Walmart...
by Gary Hoover | Dec 7, 2017 | Articles, Retailing
This article first appeared on December 7, 2017 in The Archbridge Institute’s ‘American Originals’ series. From inauspicious beginnings rose one of the great entrepreneurs in American history, a man with unusual dedication and exceptionally...