kohls (NYSE: KSS) is an American department store chain headquartered in Menomonee Falls, Wisconsin, a suburb of Milwaukee. As of January 2007, kohls operated 817 stores in 45 states. kohls mission, as stated in store and online, is to be the leading value-oriented, family-focused, specialty department store. Based on 2005 revenue, kohls is the twenty-third-largest retailer in the United States.[1]
The company entered the S&P 500 list in 1998 and is also listed in the Fortune 500.
Contents
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* 1 History
o 1.1 Beginnings
o 1.2 Expansion
* 2 Store design
* 3 Merchandise
* 4 Online shopping
* 5 References
* 6 External links
[edit] History
[edit] Beginnings
Max Kohl, who had previously operated traditional grocery stores, built his first kohls supermarket in 1946, first in what would become a southeastern Wisconsin chain known as kohls Food Stores. [1] In 1962, he started his first department store, also called kohls Department Stores.
In 1972 the British-American Tobacco Company's (parent of U.S. subsidiary Brown & Williamson Tobacco Co.) U.S. retail division, BATUS Inc., bought a controlling interest in kohls Corp., which at the time operated 50 grocery stores, six department stores, three drug stores and three liquor stores.[2] The Kohl family, led by Allen and Herb Kohl, stayed on to manage the company. The family left the management in 1979, and Herb Kohl went on to become a United States Senator and owner of the Milwaukee Bucks. This firm expanded kohls presence from 10 to 39 stores in Wisconsin, Illinois and Indiana. The grocery stores were eventually sold to A&P in 1983, operating under the name kohls II, but the last of them were later closed in 2003.
[edit] Expansion
A group of investors, including the senior management, purchased the company in 1986, and the company added 27 more stores in the next two years. In 1988, the chain acquired 26 locations from Chicago-based MainStreet, gaining several stores in Chicagoland, Minneapolis, Minnesota and parts of Michigan. In 1992, the company went public and a period of expansion began. kohls entered mid-Atlantic markets in 1997 (opening in many former locations of Clover, an offshoot of the Strawbridge's corporation, brand department stores in the Philadelphia region); Texas and Missouri in 1999; Georgia and the Southeast in 2001; New England in 2002; California and the Southwest in 2003; and the Northwest in 2006.
The chain's expansion has mainly focused on the middle of the country; however, they recently expanded into the Rochester and Buffalo markets in Western New York. In April 2005, the company opened stores in Florida and other Southern states.
Opening in January 2007 is kohls design office, to be located in the heart of New York's Garment District. The 23,000-square-foot facility, located at 1359 Broadway, is the company's first product-design presence in the nation's fashion capital.
[edit] Store design
The exterior of a typical kohls department store.
The exterior of a typical kohls department store.
While some locations are in enclosed shopping malls, the majority of stores are free-standing.
kohls operates differently from traditional department stores. The most noticeable distinction between kohls and traditional department stores is that all kohls stores have centralized checkout aisles. This has led many observers to consider kohls a hybrid of a department store and a mass merchandiser.
kohls also pioneered the use of a "racetrack" aisle that circles the entire store, a technique borrowed from discount stores but rarely used in department stores.[2]
[edit] Merchandise
kohls stores feature nationally recognized brand-name merchandise, exclusive labels, and private-branded goods, virtually the same merchandise mix as traditional department stores. The stores sell a variety of goods, such as apparel, shoes, and accessories for women, children and men, and home products such as small electronics, bedding, toys, and luggage. kohls exclusive lines include Candie's, Chaps by Ralph Lauren for Men, Women and Children, Simply Vera by Vera Wang (launching in Fall 2007), Casa Cristina by award-winning TV personality Cristina Saralegui, cosmetic brands created by Estee Lauder, Tony Hawk Apparel, and Food Network-branded housewares and cookware. kohls is also famous for the shirt-box-tie combo made famous by Dave Schwartz
