Trader Joes
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| Private | |
| Industry | Retail (grocery) |
| Founded | 1958 (as Pronto Market) 1967 (as Trader Joe's) Pasadena, California, U.S. |
| Founder | Joe Coulombe |
| Headquarters | Monrovia, California, US |
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Number of locations
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461 (as of February 16, 2017) |
|
Key people
|
Dan Bane, CEO |
| Products | Private label staple foods, organic foods and specialty products |
| Revenue |
 US$ 13 billion (2015)
|
|
Number of employees
|
38,000+ |
| Website | www.traderjoes.com |
Trader Joe's is a privately held chain of neighborhood grocery stores based in Monrovia, California. As of February 16, 2017, Trader Joe's had 461 stores nationwide in 41 states and in Washington, D.C. By 2015, it was a competitor in "fresh format" grocery stores in the United States.
Trader Joe's was founded by Joseph "Joe" Coulombe. From 1979, it was owned by Aldi Nord's German owner Theo Albrecht until his death in 2010, when ownership passed to his heirs. Aldi Nord entirely owns and operates Trader Joe's through an Albrecht family trust. The company has offices in Monrovia, California, and Boston, Massachusetts.
Trader Joe's is named after its founder, Joe Coulombe. The chain began in 1958 as a Greater Los Angeles area chain of Pronto Market convenience stores. The original Pronto Markets were so similar to 7-Eleven that Coulombe felt the competition with 7-Eleven would be ruinous.
Coulombe is said to have developed the idea of the Trader Joe's South Seas motif while on vacation in the Caribbean. The Tiki culture fad of the 1950s and 1960s was fresh in the cultural memory, and Trader Vic's was at its height with 25 locations worldwide. He had noticed that Americans were traveling more and returning home with tastes for food and wine they had trouble satisfying in supermarkets of the time.
The first store branded as "Trader Joe's" opened in 1967. This store, on Arroyo Parkway in Pasadena, California, remains in operation. In the first few decades of operation, some of the stores offered fresh meats provided by butchers who leased space in the stores. Trader Joe's at one time had sandwich shops, freshly cut cheese and freshly squeezed orange juice.
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Wikipedia