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The TJX Companies, Inc. (abbreviated TJX) is an American multinational off-price
department store 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 appe ...
corporation, headquartered in
Framingham, Massachusetts Framingham () is a city in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts in the United States. Incorporated in 1700, it is located in Middlesex County and the MetroWest subregion of the Greater Boston metropolitan area. The city proper covers with a pop ...
. It was formed as a subsidiary of Zayre Corp. in 1987, and became the legal successor to Zayre Corp. following a company reorganization in 1989. , TJX operates
TJ Maxx TJ Maxx (stylized as T•J•maxx) is an American department store chain, selling at prices generally lower than other major similar stores. It has more than 1,000 stores in the United States, making it one of the largest clothing retailers in ...
(in the United States) and
TK Maxx TK Maxx is a subsidiary of the American apparel and home goods company TJX Companies based in Framingham, Massachusetts. The stores operate throughout the United Kingdom, Australia, Ireland, Germany, Poland, Austria and the Netherlands, ...
(in Australia and Europe), its flagship store chains, along with
Marshalls Marshalls is an American chain of off-price department stores owned by TJX Companies. Marshalls has over 1,000 American stores, including larger stores named Marshalls Mega Store, covering 42 states and Puerto Rico, and 61 stores in Canada. M ...
,
HomeGoods HomeGoods is a chain of home furnishing stores headquartered in Framingham, Massachusetts. It was founded as a small chain in 1992, and grew to include hundreds of locations throughout the United States. HomeGoods sells furniture, linens, cooki ...
,
HomeSense HomeSense (stylized as Homesense in Europe and the United States) is a Canadian chain of discount home furnishing stores owned by TJX Companies. It originated in Canada in 2001, and was expanded to Europe in 2008 and the United States in 2017. ...
, Sierra in the United States, and HomeSense, Marshalls,
Winners Winners Merchants International L.P is a chain of off-price Canadian department stores owned by TJX Companies. It offers brand name clothing, footwear, bedding, furniture, fine jewelry, beauty products, and housewares. Products are at a 20-60 ...
in Canada. There are over 4,557 discount stores in the TJX portfolio located in nine countries. TJX ranked No. 97 in the 2021
Fortune 500 The ''Fortune'' 500 is an annual list compiled and published by ''Fortune (magazine), Fortune'' magazine that ranks 500 of the largest United States Joint-stock company#Closely held corporations and publicly traded corporations, corporations by ...
list of the largest United States corporations by total revenue.


History


Zayre

The roots of The TJX Companies date back to 1977 when the first TJ Maxx store opened in
Auburn, Massachusetts Auburn is a town in Worcester County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 16,889 at the 2020 census. History The Auburn area was first settled in 1714 as of today outer parts of Worcester, Sutton, Leicester and Oxford, Massachus ...
as part of the discount department store chain
Zayre Zayre () was a chain of discount stores that operated in the eastern half of the United States from 1956 to 1990. The company's headquarters was in Framingham, Massachusetts. In October 1988, Zayre's parent company, Zayre Corp., sold the stores ...
. In June 1987, Zayre established The TJX companies as a subsidiary. In the first half of 1988, Zayre stores had operating losses of $69 million on sales of $1.4 billion. Observers blamed technological inferiority, poor maintenance, inappropriate pricing, and inventory pileups, and Zayre appeared ripe for takeover. Throughout all this, however, The TJX Companies subsidiary continued to yield a profit. In October 1988, Zayre Corp. decided to focus its energies on TJX. It sold the entire chain of nearly 400 Zayre stores to
Ames Department Stores Inc. Ames Department Stores Inc. was an American chain of discount stores based in Rocky Hill, Connecticut, United States. The company was founded in 1958 with a store in Southbridge, Massachusetts, and at its peak operated 700 stores in 20 states, ...
In exchange, the company received $431.4 million in cash, a receivable note, and what was then valued at $140 million of Ames cumulative senior convertible preferred stock. The company continued focus on its core business, selling unrelated operations including
BJ's Wholesale Club BJ's Wholesale Club Holdings, Inc., commonly referred as BJ's, is an American membership-only warehouse club chain based in Marlborough, Massachusetts, operating on the East Coast of the United States in addition to Ohio, Michigan, and Indi ...
and Home Club, leaving it with just one brand, T.J. Maxx.2004 Annual Report In June 1989, Zayre Corp. acquired the outstanding minority interest in TJX and merged with the subsidiary, changing its name from Zayre Corp. to The TJX Companies, Inc. in the process. The newly named company began trading on the New York Stock Exchange.


Expansion

In 1990, TJX expanded into an additional store brand division, and at the same time it first went international, as it entered the Canadian market by acquiring the five-store Winners chain. Two years later, it launched its third brand, HomeGoods, in the United States. TJX's expansion beyond North America came in 1994, when the fourth brand division, T.K. Maxx, was founded in the
United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and ...
, and then expanded into
Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean, in north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel, the Irish Sea, and St George's Channel. Ireland is the s ...
. In 1995, TJX doubled in size when it acquired Marshalls, its fifth brand. T.J. Maxx and Marshalls later became consolidated as two brands under a single division, The Marmaxx Group. The following year, TJX Companies Inc. was added to the
Standard & Poor S&P Global Ratings (previously Standard & Poor's and informally known as S&P) is an American credit rating agency (CRA) and a division of S&P Global that publishes financial research and analysis on stocks, bonds, and commodities. S&P is cons ...
's
S&P 500 The Standard and Poor's 500, or simply the S&P 500, is a stock market index tracking the stock performance of 500 large companies listed on stock exchanges in the United States. It is one of the most commonly followed equity indices. As of ...
Composite Index, which consists of 500 of the largest companies in the United States. TJX sold Hit or Miss, a discount mall based clothing store in 1995 as well through an employee leveraged buyout. TJX launched a sixth brand, A.J. Wright, in 1998 in the eastern U.S. The brand went national in 2004 when it opened its first stores in California on the west coast. The company's seventh brand division, HomeSense, formed in 2001, was a Canadian brand modeled after the existing US brand, HomeGoods. In 2002, TJX revenue reached almost $12 billion. In mid-2003, TJX acquired an eighth brand division, Bob's Stores, concentrated in
New England New England is a region comprising six states in the Northeastern United States: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont. It is bordered by the state of New York to the west and by the Canadian provinces ...
. In Canada, TJX began to configure some Winners and HomeSense stores side by side as superstores. The superstores feature open passageways between them, with dual branding. TJX's revenue in 2003 reached over $13 billion. TJX began to test the side-by-side superstore model in the United States in 2004, combining some of each of the two Marmaxx brand stores with HomeGoods. The company reached 141st position in the 2004
Fortune 500 The ''Fortune'' 500 is an annual list compiled and published by ''Fortune (magazine), Fortune'' magazine that ranks 500 of the largest United States Joint-stock company#Closely held corporations and publicly traded corporations, corporations by ...
rankings, with almost $15 billion in revenue. That year was also marked by the death of retired Zayre founder Stanley Feldberg. In April 2008, TJX launched the
HomeSense HomeSense (stylized as Homesense in Europe and the United States) is a Canadian chain of discount home furnishing stores owned by TJX Companies. It originated in Canada in 2001, and was expanded to Europe in 2008 and the United States in 2017. ...
brand in the UK, with six stores opening throughout May. The brand is more upmarket than its Canadian namesake. Later that year, in August, TJX sold Bob's Stores to Versa Capital Management and Crystal Capital. In December 2010, TJX announced that the A.J. Wright stores would be closed, cutting about 4,400 jobs, and that more than half of them would reopen under other company brands. In July 2015, TJX acquired the
Trade Secret Trade secrets are a type of intellectual property that includes formulas, practices, processes, designs, instruments, patterns, or compilations of information that have inherent economic value because they are not generally known or readily ...
and Home Secret off-price retail businesses from Australian company
Gazal Corporation Gazal Corporation Limited (Gazal, ) was a leading Australian branded clothing company and was a listed public company of the Australian Stock Exchange. The company was based in Banksmeadow in the Australian state of New South Wales. Its main busi ...
Limited. The deal was completed in December. In October, Ernie Herrman was named CEO of the company, replacing Carol Meyrowitz. He took over in January 2016. In November 2019, TJX purchased a 25% stake in Russian retailer Familia.


COVID-19 impact

On August 19, 2020, TJX Companies continue to deal with the
COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identi ...
's effect on its business. The company announced that revenues dropped 31% over the months of May, June, and July, primarily due to extensive closures of the shop for around one-third of the period. TJX Companies reported a second-quarter loss of $214 million.


Incidents


Computer systems intrusion

On January 17, 2007, TJX announced that it was the victim of an unauthorized computer systems intrusion. It discovered in mid-December 2006 that its computer systems were compromised and customer data was stolen. The hackers accessed a system that stores data on
credit card A credit card is a payment card issued to users (cardholders) to enable the cardholder to pay a merchant for goods and services based on the cardholder's accrued debt (i.e., promise to the card issuer to pay them for the amounts plus the ...
,
debit card A debit card, also known as a check card or bank card is a payment card that can be used in place of cash to make purchases. The term '' plastic card'' includes the above and as an identity document. These are similar to a credit card, but ...
, check, and merchandise return transactions. The intrusion was kept confidential as requested by law enforcement. TJX said that it was working with
General Dynamics General Dynamics Corporation (GD) is an American publicly traded, aerospace and defense corporation headquartered in Reston, Virginia. As of 2020, it was the fifth-largest defense contractor in the world by arms sales, and 5th largest in the Uni ...
, IBM and
Deloitte Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu Limited (), commonly referred to as Deloitte, is an international professional services network headquartered in London, England. Deloitte is the largest professional services network by revenue and number of professio ...
to upgrade computer security. By the end of March 2007, the number of affected customers had reached 45.7 million, and prompted
credit bureau A credit bureau is a data collection agency that gathers account information from various creditors and provides that information to a consumer reporting agency in the United States, a credit reference agency in the United Kingdom, a credit rep ...
s to seek legislation requiring retailers to be responsible for compromised customer information saved in their systems. In addition to credit card numbers, personal information such as
social security number In the United States, a Social Security number (SSN) is a nine-digit number issued to U.S. citizens, permanent residents, and temporary (working) residents under section 205(c)(2) of the Social Security Act, codified as . The number is issued to ...
s and
driver's license A driver's license is a legal authorization, or the official document confirming such an authorization, for a specific individual to operate one or more types of motorized vehicles—such as motorcycles, cars, trucks, or buses—on a publi ...
numbers from 451,000 customers were downloaded by the intruders. The breach was possible due to a non-secure
wireless network A wireless network is a computer network that uses wireless data connections between network nodes. Wireless networking is a method by which homes, telecommunications networks and business installations avoid the costly process of introducing ...
in one of the stores. Eleven men were charged in the theft, and one (Damon Patrick Toey) pleaded guilty to numerous charges related to the breach. Another,
Jonathan James Jonathan Joseph James (December 12, 1983 – May 18, 2008) was an American hacker (a gray hat ethical hacker) who was the first juvenile incarcerated for cybercrime in the United States. The South Florida native was 15 years old at the time of ...
, professed his innocence and later committed suicide, apparently out of the belief that he was going to be indicted. The alleged ringleader Albert Gonzalez, was later indicted in August 2009 with attacking Heartland Payment Systems, where 130 million records were compromised.


List of brands


Current brands


Divisions

* Marmaxx – TJ Maxx and Marshalls (US) * HomeGoods – HomeGoods and HomeSense (US) * TJX Canada – Winners, HomeSense (Canada), and Marshalls (Canada) * TJX International – TK Maxx and HomeSense (UK and Ireland)


Former brands


References


Sources

*


External links

{{Authority control 1989 establishments in Massachusetts Companies based in Framingham, Massachusetts Companies listed on the New York Stock Exchange Retail companies established in 1989 Retail companies of the United Kingdom