In business, name recognition is everything. Some brands are so ubiquitous, however, that you don't even need a name to recognize them—all you need is a logo, like Nike's iconic swoosh that makes it one of the most recognized companies in modern culture.
Sure, today, everyone knows Nike. But in 1964, no one did. That's when University of Portland track-and-field coach Bill Bowerman partnered with Phil Knight, a former mid-distance runner on his track and field team, to establish Blue Ribbon Sports. Since the 1950s, Bowerman had been searching for an alternative to traditional, German-made running shoes, which he believed hindered runners' performance because of their weight and the materials used to make them. When he began developing his own shoes, his first guinea pig was Knight, who was looking for a post-college career that allowed him to still pursue his passion for athletics. After he learned about Japanese running shoes, which he found to be superior to the ones made in Germany, Knight convinced the shoe manufacturer Onitsuka Tiger to export its products to the United States, and grant him the exclusive rights to sell them. Each investing $500, Knight and Bowerman subsequently started Blue Ribbon Sports to import the Japanese sneakers, which they sold in Portland from the trunk of Knight's car.
Half Baked? Chunky Monkey? Cherry Garcia? Whatever your favorite flavor of Ben & Jerry's ice cream may be, you owe its existence to best friends Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield, who opened their first ice cream scoop shop in 1978 inside a renovated gas station in Burlington, Vermont. They had hardly any money (just $8,000 in cash and a $4,000 bank loan) and even less experience (a $5 correspondence course in ice cream making from Penn State).
And while it may sound like a recipe for a bad business plan, it was a step up of sorts: Cohen, an artist, made pottery that no one was buying, and Greenfield wanted to be a doctor, but failed to get into medical school. So, they agreed to open up a shop together. Initially, the plan was to sell bagels. When bagel-making equipment proved to be too expensive, however, they set their sights on ice cream, which they began packaging in pints to sell at local grocery stores in 1980. Forty years later, the company produces up to 400 pints of ice cream per minute.
The first Starbucks opened in 1971 in Seattle, where it sold fresh-brewed whole-bean coffees from a single narrow storefront in the city's historic Pike Place Market. A decade later, future chairman and CEO Howard Schultz became a loyal customer. He liked the company so much that he joined it as director of retail operations and marketing in 1982, the same year that Starbucks began providing coffee to local restaurants and espresso bars.
After visiting Italy in 1983, Schultz wanted to bring Italian espresso-bar culture to the U.S., and in 1984, he convinced Starbucks' founders to open an Italian-style coffeehouse in downtown Seattle. A year later, Schultz struck out on his own and founded Il Giornale, a small chain of retail coffee shops that brewed coffee and espresso beverages made from Starbucks coffee beans. In 1987, Il Giornale acquired Starbucks and changed its name to Starbucks Corp. At that point, there were 17 Starbucks stores. More than 30 years later, there are 30,000 of them.
Before Whole Foods Market became the Cadillac of grocery stores, it more closely resembled a humble Chevy. It all started in 1978, when 25-year-old college dropout John Mackey and his girlfriend, Renee Lawson, borrowed $45,000 from friends and relatives to open SaferWay, a small natural foods store in Austin, Texas. Space was so limited that the couple had to store extra inventory in their apartment, which led to them being evicted. After that, they had to move into the store itself, and bathe with a water hose attached to their commercial dishwasher.
Two years later, they merged SaferWay with Clarksville Natural Grocery, which was owned by business partners Craig Weller and Mark Skiles. The new joint venture, Whole Foods Market, opened its first store on Sept. 20, 1980. That original location was 10,500 square feet and employed 19 workers—a far cry from what the brand has become. Today, Whole Foods has 95,000 employees and 509 stores in three countries, each of which is an average of 40,000 square feet. Grocery store? More like grocery empire.
Walmart is the world's largest retailer. But before it was the retail juggernaut we know today, it was a humble five-and-dime. Walmart's origins date back to 1950, when founder Sam Walton opened Walton's 5&10 in Bentonville, Arkansas. It was Walton's second general store, but the first to bear his name. Motivated by that store's success, Walton decided to open his first Walmart in 1962 in nearby Rogers, Arkansas. The company—built on the promise of lower prices and better service—went public in 1970 and has been growing ever since. Today, 90 percent of the U.S. population lives within 10 miles of a Walmart. Sales have experienced a similar trajectory, skyrocketing from just $75,000 in 1951 to $514.4 billion in 2019.