Donald Fisher
| Donald Fisher | |
|---|---|
| Born |
Donald George Fisher September 3, 1928 San Francisco, California, US |
| Died | September 27, 2009 (aged 81) San Francisco, California, US |
| Cause of death | Cancer |
| Alma mater | University of California, Berkeley |
| Occupation | Founder The Gap clothing stores |
| Net worth | US$3.3 billion |
| Political party | Republican |
| Spouse(s) | Doris Feigenbaum Fisher |
| Children |
Robert J. Fisher William S. Fisher John J. Fisher |
| Parent(s) | Sydney Fisher Aileen Emanuel |
Donald George Fisher (September 3, 1928 – September 27, 2009) was an American businessman and philanthropist. He co-founded The Gap clothing stores with his wife Doris F. Fisher.
Fisher was born in San Francisco, California to a Jewish family, the eldest of three sons of Aileen (née Emanuel) and Sydney Fisher, a cabinetmaker. He spent his childhood in the then-middle-class Sea Cliff neighborhood of San Francisco, He graduated from Lowell High School in 1946, and then in 1951, graduated with a B.S. in business administration from the University of California, Berkeley where he was a member of both the Swimming and Water Polo Teams. He is an alumnus of the Theta Zeta chapter of the national fraternity Delta Kappa Epsilon. After school, he served as a U.S. Naval Reserve as an officer and then worked for his father as a cabinet-maker for L. & E. Emanuel Incorporated, a mill and cabinet making firm created by his great-grandfather that his mother inherited after her father died. In the 1960s Fisher started his own business renovating hotels and bought the Capitol Park Hotel in Sacramento fortuitously leasing some retail space to Levi Strauss & Co. which opened a showroom. After unsuccessfully trying to return a pair of Levi's jeans that did not fit, he noticed that most department stores only carried a limited selection of Levi's jeans and suggested to Levi's that they needed a store that would carry all their sizes and styles in one store. The concept was accepted and Fisher and his wife opened their first store named the Gap after the "Generation Gap." The store sold Levi's jeans as well as records and tapes in order to capture the 12-to-25-year-old target market. In 1972, the Fishers launched the Gap label, becoming the first chain in retail history to use its store name as the brand name. The Gap was a resounding success and filed for an IPO in 1973. They went on to purchase Banana Republic, a small, two store mail-order catalogue business; and also founded Old Navy which reached $1 billion in sales in four years. Fisher served as CEO until 1995, Chairman of the Board until 2004, and as company director and Chairman Emeritus until his death.
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