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Giant Tiger Stores Limited is a Canadian
discount store
A discount store or discounter offers a retail format in which products are sold at prices that are in principle lower than an actual or supposed "full retail price". Discounters rely on bulk purchasing and efficient distribution to keep down cost ...
chain which operates over 260 stores across Canada. The company's stores operate under the Giant Tiger banner in
Alberta
Alberta ( ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is part of Western Canada and is one of the three prairie provinces. Alberta is bordered by British Columbia to the west, Saskatchewan to the east, the Northwest Ter ...
,
Manitoba
Manitoba ( ) is a Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Canada at the Centre of Canada, longitudinal centre of the country. It is Canada's Population of Canada by province and territory, fifth-most populous province, with a population o ...
,
New Brunswick
New Brunswick (french: Nouveau-Brunswick, , locally ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is one of the three Maritime provinces and one of the four Atlantic provinces. It is the only province with both English and ...
,
Nova Scotia
Nova Scotia ( ; ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is one of the three Maritime provinces and one of the four Atlantic provinces. Nova Scotia is Latin for "New Scotland".
Most of the population are native Eng ...
,
Ontario
Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central Ca ...
,
Prince Edward Island
Prince Edward Island (PEI; ) is one of the thirteen Provinces and territories of Canada, provinces and territories of Canada. It is the smallest province in terms of land area and population, but the most densely populated. The island has seve ...
and
Saskatchewan
Saskatchewan ( ; ) is a Provinces and territories of Canada, province in Western Canada, western Canada, bordered on the west by Alberta, on the north by the Northwest Territories, on the east by Manitoba, to the northeast by Nunavut, and on t ...
; under the GTExpress and Scott's Discount banners in
Ontario
Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central Ca ...
only, and under the Tigre Géant banner in
Quebec
Quebec ( ; )According to the Canadian government, ''Québec'' (with the acute accent) is the official name in Canadian French and ''Quebec'' (without the accent) is the province's official name in Canadian English is one of the thirtee ...
.
As of 2021, the chain reports annual sales of roughly $2 billion and employs about 10,000 people. The headquarters is located on
Walkley Road
Walkley Road ( Ottawa Road #74) is a major road in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. It runs from Riverside Drive to Ramseyville Road (formerly Baseline Road). It is mostly a four-lane divided road which runs through both residential and industrial area ...
in
Ottawa
Ottawa (, ; Canadian French: ) is the capital city of Canada. It is located at the confluence of the Ottawa River and the Rideau River in the southern portion of the province of Ontario. Ottawa borders Gatineau, Quebec, and forms the core ...
. In 2018, the company opened a distribution centre in
Johnstown, halfway between Montreal and Toronto, at the intersection of Ontario's
Highway 401
King's Highway 401, commonly referred to as Highway 401 and also known by its official name as the Macdonald–Cartier Freeway or colloquially referred to as the four-oh-one,
is a controlled-access 400-series highway in the Canadian provin ...
and
Highway 416.
It is a participant in the voluntary
Scanner Price Accuracy Code
The Scanner Price Accuracy Code is a Canadian retail voluntary practice managed by the Retail Council of Canada and endorsed by the Competition Bureau. It was introduced in June 2002 as Canadian retailers were in the midst of updating their point- ...
managed by the
Retail Council of Canada
The Retail Council of Canada (french: Conseil canadien du commerce de détail), founded in 1963, is a not-for-profit trade association representing retail
Retail is the sale of goods and services to consumers, in contrast to wholesaling, ...
.
Business model
Inspiration
In the mid and late 1940s, Giant Tiger founder
Gordon Reid, who was then in his early twenties, was a travelling salesman for an importer in the United States.
[Gordon Pitts, "Tightwad philosophy keeps Tiger running", ''Ottawa Citizen'', September 27, 1980.] In the American
Midwest
The Midwestern United States, also referred to as the Midwest or the American Midwest, is one of four Census Bureau Region, census regions of the United States Census Bureau (also known as "Region 2"). It occupies the northern central part of ...
, Reid first saw discount stores. Discount stores were a new concept at the time. He was particularly impressed by Uncle Bill's, a chain headquartered in
Cleveland, Ohio
Cleveland ( ), officially the City of Cleveland, is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Cuyahoga County. Located in the northeastern part of the state, it is situated along the southern shore of Lake Erie, across the U.S. ...
,
which was one of his clients.
The discount store concept did not yet exist in Canada, and it therefore represented a business opportunity.
Reid reports that he was also inspired by
Frank Woolworth’s continent-wide success, half a century earlier, in creating hundreds of profitable
Five-and-Dime
A variety store (also five and dime (historic), pound shop, or dollar store) is a retail store that sells general merchandise, such as apparel, automotive parts, dry goods, toys, hardware, home furnishings, and a selection of groceries. It us ...
stores. Reid’s own retail experience, dating back to his first job as a teenager, had been in
department stores
A department store is a retail establishment offering a wide range of consumer goods in different areas of the store, each area ("department") specializing in a product category. In modern major cities, the department store made a dramatic appea ...
rather than in discount, but his mother had worked behind the luncheon counter at a
Woolworth’s in
downtown Montreal
Downtown Montreal ( French: ''Centre-Ville de Montréal'') is the central business district of Montreal, Quebec, Canada.
The district is situated on the southernmost slope of Mount Royal, and occupies the western portion of the borough of Vil ...
.
[Vito Pilieci, "New CEO grabs Tiger by the tail", ''Ottawa Citizen'', October 15, 2010.]
Reid stated, four decades later, that he had believed, even at this early stage, that it would be possible to build a Canada-wide chain based on this model. Asked by a reporter whether he had ever imagined that Giant Tiger would eventually have the success it was then enjoying, Reid stated, "Yes. That was the original intention. The idea for the business came when I was a travelling salesman. I saw the discounters growing. My original inspiration was the F.W. Woolworth Co., obviously that was a big chain. So this was always the plan."
Ownership structure
Key head office personnel are co-owners of Giant Tiger Stores Limited. Initially, Giant Tiger’s head office was quite small; and ownership was therefore shared among a small number of people. By 1980, ownership had been shared between Reid and ten key employees.
[Gordon Pitts, "Tightwad philosophy keeps Tiger running. ''Ottawa Citizen'', September 27, 1980.] Gordon Reid has stated that Canada’s
agricultural cooperative movement was his inspiration for this innovation.
Making his employees into part-owners of the company ensured that, as in the coop movement, all employees would share a common interest in maximizing profits.
Franchise system
Giant Tiger #1, opened in Ottawa's historic
Byward Market in 1961, was company-owned. The first franchised Giant Tiger was opened by Jean-Guy Desjardins in
Maniwaki
Maniwaki is a town located north of Gatineau and north-west of Montreal, in the province of Quebec, Canada. The town is situated on the Gatineau River, at the crossroads of Quebec Route 105, Route 105 and Quebec Route 107, Route 107, not far south ...
in 1968. As Reid would explain it forty years later, from the moment the change was made, "the
aniwakistore made money and I didn't have to do anything.
ean-Guy Desjardinsdid the advertising, he found the location, he merchandised it to suit his customers, he did everything… And, I thought, 'by golly, that's a good system.'"
[Kristin Goff,]
Canada’s national Tiger
", ''Ottawa Citizen'', November 17, 2007.
Because the chain most often has been shoehorned into existing spaces now too small for the major
big-box store
A big-box store (also hyperstore, supercenter, superstore, or megastore) is a physically large retail establishment, usually part of a chain of stores. The term sometimes also refers, by extension, to the company that operates the store. The t ...
or
hypermarket
A hypermarket (sometimes called a hyperstore, supercentre or superstore) is a big-box store combining a supermarket and a department store. The result is an expansive retail facility carrying a wide range of products under one roof, including ...
chains, individual store managers are given wide leeway in ordering decisions and are free to devote their limited floor space to items which sell well in their local market. This flexibility, and a distribution system in which stores are restocked daily, allows stores to "pull" only the inventory they immediately need and facilitates greater turnover per square foot of scarce retail space.
In 2010, Reid reported that the issuing of no-cost franchises to experienced retailers "was a great way to get experienced people. Over the years we had a lot come from
Woolworth,
Kresge,
Kmart
Kmart Corporation ( , doing business as Kmart and stylized as kmart) is an American retail company that owns a chain of big box department stores. The company is headquartered in Hoffman Estates, Illinois, United States.
The company was inc ...
and later
Zellers
Zellers was a Canadian discount department retail chain and is currently a brand name owned by the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC). Founded in 1931 in London, Ontario, in later decades it was based in Brampton, Ontario. Zellers was acquired by HBC i ...
." In the same interview, Reid stated that over twenty Giant Tiger franchises are now run by former
Walmart
Walmart Inc. (; formerly Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.) is an American multinational retail corporation that operates a chain of hypermarkets (also called supercenters), discount department stores, and grocery stores from the United States, headquarter ...
employees, most of whom had been attracted by the same franchise system that he had introduced decades earlier.
History
Number of stores
Gordon Reid opened the first Giant Tiger store, on George Street in Ottawa’s
Byward Market, on May 13, 1961, with a $15,000 investment.
[Laurie McBurney, "Giant Tiger roars loud in the discount jungle". ''Ottawa Citizen'', November 29, 1999, p. D3.] First-year sales of $139,781 were far lower than Reid had anticipated, and by the end of 1962, he decided to close the store. Unexpectedly, the rush of customers attracted by his going out of business sale provided enough cash flow to keep the business afloat.
[David Scanlan, "King of the Discount Jungle", in ''Ottawa Citizen'', October 18, 1991, p. F1.]
Although the store survived, expansion was slow. A second location, in the small town of
Brockville
Brockville, formerly Elizabethtown, is a city in Eastern Ontario, Canada, in the Thousand Islands region. Although it is the seat of the United Counties of Leeds and Grenville, it is politically Independent city, independent of the county. It i ...
, was not opened until 1965.
By the time, of the company's tenth anniversary, in 1971, it still had only six stores.
As of 2018, there are 230 stores, the most recent three being opened on October 12, 2018 in
Saskatoon
Saskatoon () is the largest city in the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Saskatchewan. It straddles a bend in the South Saskatchewan River in the central region of the province. It is located along the Trans-Canada Hig ...
,
Windsor
Windsor may refer to:
Places Australia
* Windsor, New South Wales
** Municipality of Windsor, a former local government area
* Windsor, Queensland, a suburb of Brisbane, Queensland
**Shire of Windsor, a former local government authority around Wi ...
and
Hamilton Hamilton may refer to:
People
* Hamilton (name), a common British surname and occasional given name, usually of Scottish origin, including a list of persons with the surname
** The Duke of Hamilton, the premier peer of Scotland
** Lord Hamilt ...
. The 2015, withdrawal of
Target Canada
Target Canada Co. was the Canadian subsidiary of the Target Corporation, the eighth-largest retailer in the United States. Formerly headquartered in Mississauga, Ontario, the subsidiary was formed with the acquisition of Zellers store leases fr ...
from the marketplace presented an expansion opportunity for Giant Tiger.
Its first acquisition of a Target store occurred in
Fergus, Ontario
Fergus is the largest community in Centre Wellington, a township within Wellington County in Ontario, Canada. It lies on the Grand River about 18 km NNW of Guelph. The population of this community at the time of the 2016 Census was 20,767, ...
where of an approximately large Target store was acquired by Giant Tiger. This location opened in the spring of 2016.
Geographic expansion
In 2001, Giant Tiger and
The North West Company
The North West Company is a multinational Canadian grocery and retail company which operates stores in Canada's western provinces and northern territories, as well as the US states of Alaska, Hawaii, and several other countries and US territ ...
(NWC) signed a 30-year Master Franchise Agreement that grants NWC the exclusive right to open and operate 72 Giant Tiger stores in western Canada by 2032. In 2013, thirty-one of these stores were open and NWC was eyeing expansion into older city neighbourhoods and rural towns too small to support a Target or
Walmart
Walmart Inc. (; formerly Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.) is an American multinational retail corporation that operates a chain of hypermarkets (also called supercenters), discount department stores, and grocery stores from the United States, headquarter ...
.
The chain has undertaken a major expansion in the Greater Toronto Area since 2005. It has opened seven stores in Bradford, Brampton, Markham (now closed), Newmarket, Scarborough and Etobicoke.
The 200th Giant Tiger store opened in Nova Scotia in October 2010.
In 2004, Giant Tiger opened a single store in
Potsdam, New York
Potsdam ( moh, Tsi tewate’nehtararénies) is a town in St. Lawrence County, New York, United States. The town population was 14,901 at the 2020 census. The ZIP Code is 13676. When SUNY Potsdam and Clarkson University are in session, the popul ...
, its first (and only) in the United States. This store closed during the
Great Recession
The Great Recession was a period of marked general decline, i.e. a recession, observed in national economies globally that occurred from late 2007 into 2009. The scale and timing of the recession varied from country to country (see map). At ...
in 2009.
Franchising
In 1968, Giant Tiger opened its first franchise stores, which now account for the majority of locations. The goal was to better serve the customer by having local owners in the stores.
Between 2001 and 2020,
The North West Company
The North West Company is a multinational Canadian grocery and retail company which operates stores in Canada's western provinces and northern territories, as well as the US states of Alaska, Hawaii, and several other countries and US territ ...
operated all of Giant Tiger's locations in western Canada under a single master franchise agreement.
In March 2020, The North West Company announced that it would sell 34 of its 46 franchises to Giant Tiger, while closing six underperforming locations, maintaining five in northern markets, and converting one (Prince Albert) to a different banner.
New brands/trade names
In 1977, Giant Tiger established Chez Tante Marie stores in
Hull and
Gatineau
Gatineau ( ; ) is a city in western Quebec, Canada. It is located on the northern bank of the Ottawa River, immediately across from Ottawa, Ontario. Gatineau is the largest city in the Outaouais administrative region and is part of Canada's N ...
, Quebec. The Hull store closed in 2015. Another Chez Tante Marie store existed in
Lachute
Lachute () is a town in southwest Quebec, Canada, northwest of Montreal, on the Rivière du Nord, a tributary of the Ottawa River, and west of Mirabel International Airport. It is located on Autoroute 50, at the junctions of Quebec Provincial ...
,
Quebec
Quebec ( ; )According to the Canadian government, ''Québec'' (with the acute accent) is the official name in Canadian French and ''Quebec'' (without the accent) is the province's official name in Canadian English is one of the thirtee ...
; this store has since been rebranded as Tigre Géant.
In 2017, the last Chez Tante Marie store, in Gatineau, was rebranded as Tigre Géant.
In 1996, the Scott's Discount brand was launched as an alternative format for smaller stores.
In 2008, Giant Tiger opened its first GT Xpress outlet at a former Giant Tiger location in Ottawa's
Hintonburg
Hintonburg is a neighbourhood in Kitchissippi Ward in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, located west of the Downtown core. It is a historically working-class, predominantly residential neighbourhood, with a commercial strip located along Wellington Street ...
neighbourhood. GT Xpress stores are intended to service less mobile residents of densely populated neighbourhoods, so that residents will not have to leave the neighbourhood to shop at a
big-box store
A big-box store (also hyperstore, supercenter, superstore, or megastore) is a physically large retail establishment, usually part of a chain of stores. The term sometimes also refers, by extension, to the company that operates the store. The t ...
. Because larger retail spaces are unavailable in such inner-city neighbourhoods, the merchandise selection at GTXpress stores is more limited than at a full-size Giant Tiger, let alone a big-box store. Traditional lines of Giant Tiger merchandise are further restricted to free up space for an expanded produce, dairy, deli and bakery section. Effectively, a GTXpress store is a discount version of a
convenience store
A convenience store, convenience shop, corner store or corner shop is a small retail business that stocks a range of everyday items such as coffee, groceries, snack foods, confectionery, soft drinks, ice creams, tobacco products, lottery ticket ...
, characterized by a "focus on what the customer needs today, as opposed to
arrying a full assortment ofwhat the customer wants." In view of the fact that the ethnic makeup of individual inner-city neighbourhoods is likely to differ substantially, franchise owner at each GTXpress outlet will have the authority to tailor "product lines to cater to ethnic diversity in the area."
Trucking/warehousing
In 1987, Giant Tiger launched its own trucking fleet (known internally as Tiger Trucking)
[Mark McNeil, "Giant Tiger built on lots of cheap goods." ''Hamilton Spectator''. October 27, 2001, p. B2.] to make regular shipments from the warehouse to stores.
In 1999, it was reported that the company's trucks were making deliveries to each store three times a week.
[Bert Hill, "Giant Tiger keeps its stripes." ''Ottawa Citizen,'' September 15, 1999, p. D1.] In 2001, Reid reported that deliveries were taking place daily: "We have the most efficient shipping and distribution system in the general merchandise field.... It is equivalent to the grocery stores. We deliver to stores five times per week. There is no one else in the general merchandise industry that does that and we do it with our own trucks."
On May 31, 1996, Giant Tiger purchased and took possession of a distribution centre on Walkley Road in Ottawa, previously occupied by
Sears Canada
Sears Canada Inc. was a publicly-traded Canadian company affiliated with the American-based Sears department store chain. In operation from 1952 until January 14, 2018, and headquartered in Toronto, Ontario, the company began as Simpsons-Searsâ ...
. The company's headquarters moved to this location later the same year.
In December 2005, Giant Tiger opened a new distribution centre for frozen and refrigerated products in
Brockville
Brockville, formerly Elizabethtown, is a city in Eastern Ontario, Canada, in the Thousand Islands region. Although it is the seat of the United Counties of Leeds and Grenville, it is politically Independent city, independent of the county. It i ...
,
Ontario
Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central Ca ...
.
In 2018, the company opened a distribution centre in
Johnstown, halfway between Montreal and Toronto, at the intersection of Ontario's
Highway 401
King's Highway 401, commonly referred to as Highway 401 and also known by its official name as the Macdonald–Cartier Freeway or colloquially referred to as the four-oh-one,
is a controlled-access 400-series highway in the Canadian provin ...
and
Highway 416.
Changes in management structure and key personnel
In October 2010, Reid stepped down as
chief executive officer
A chief executive officer (CEO), also known as a central executive officer (CEO), chief administrator officer (CAO) or just chief executive (CE), is one of a number of corporate executives charged with the management of an organization especially ...
of Giant Tiger, in favour of Andy Gross, a 25-year veteran with the chain, who started working as a buyer when there were fewer than thirty stores. Gross had, by this time, already inherited the presidency from Jeff York.
Gross decided to retire effective August 1, 2014 and was then replaced as president and COO by Greg Farrell, who in turn was replaced on March 1, 2015 by former
Zellers
Zellers was a Canadian discount department retail chain and is currently a brand name owned by the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC). Founded in 1931 in London, Ontario, in later decades it was based in Brampton, Ontario. Zellers was acquired by HBC i ...
president and
COO
COO or coo may refer to:
Business
* Certificate of origin, used in international trade
* Chief operating officer or chief operations officer, high-ranking corporate official
* Concept of operations, used in Systems Engineering Management Process
...
Thomas Haig. As of 2015, Reid retains the posts of
chairman of the board
The chairperson, also chairman, chairwoman or chair, is the presiding officer of an organized group such as a board, committee, or deliberative assembly. The person holding the office, who is typically elected or appointed by members of the grou ...
and CEO.
A proposal to sell the company was briefly raised in October 2013,
but soon abandoned.
See also
*
List of Canadian department stores
References
External links
* {{Official website, https://www.gianttiger.com/
Companies based in Ottawa
Retail companies established in 1961
Department stores of Canada
Discount stores of Canada
Shops in Ottawa
Privately held companies of Canada
1961 establishments in Ontario