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| Lowe's |
Lowe's is the second-largest retail retailer after competitor The Home Depot and ahead of Menards in the United States. It is also the world's second-largest hardware chain, behind The Home Depot but ahead of European retailers Leroy Merlin, B&Q, and OBI as well.
In 1921 Lucius Smith Lowe (1879–1940) opened the first Lowe's store, North Wilkesboro Hardware, in North Wilkesboro, North Carolina. After Lowe died in 1940, his daughter Ruth inherited the company, who the same year sold the firm to her brother Jim. In 1943, Jim took Carl Buchan on as a friend. North Wilkesboro Hardware changed name to Lowe's Hardware in 1946.
After World War II, Buchan expected the drastic rise in construction and under his direction, the store concentrated on hardware and building materials. Prior to that, ideas, sporting products, horse shoes, snuff, vegetables and food have also been included in the commodity mix. In 1949 the company purchased a second location in Sparta, North Carolina.
Buchan was made sole owner of Lowe's in 1952. In 1954 the Lowes Foods grocery store chain launched with Jim Lowe.
By 1955, Buchan expanded the company rapidly by opening stores in Asheville, Charlotte, and Durham, in North Carolina. In the 1950s further shops opened.
Buchan died in 1961 at age 44 from a heart attack. In 1961 his five-man management team, including Robert Strickland and Leonard Herring, took over from the company public. By 1962, Lowe's had opened 21 stores and reported $32 million in annual sales. In 1979 Lowe 's began trading on the New York Stock Exchange.
Lowe's suffered from business pressures in the 1980s and growing pressure from the new big-box supermarket chain, The Home Depot. Lowe's avoided embracing the mega-store model for a while in part because its executives claimed the smaller towns where Lowe's mainly served wouldn't really tolerate large supermarkets. But essentially Lowe's followed the big-box format to survive.
Lowe's has expanded globally since then, when it was supported in 1999 by the acquisition of the Renton, Washington-based firm Eagle Hardware & Garden. The first outside U.S. store was in Hamilton, Canada, Ontario.
Finances
Lowe's announced sales of US$ 3,436 billion for fiscal year 2018, with an annual revenue of US $ 68,619 billion, an rise of 5.5 per cent over the previous fiscal period. Lowe's securities were priced at over $96 per share, and its market capitalization in October 2018 was estimated at over $75.8 billion. Lowe is rated No.40 On the Fortune 500 2018 list of the largest companies in the United States, by gross sales.
| Year | Revenue in mil USD$ | Net income in mil. USD$ | Total Assets in mil. USD$ | Price per Share in USD$ | Employees | Stores |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2005 | 36,464 | 2,167 | 21,138 | 24.62 | 162,000 | 1,087 |
| 2006 | 43,243 | 2,765 | 24,639 | 25.08 | 185,000 | 1,234 |
| 2007 | 46,927 | 3,105 | 27,767 | 24.40 | 210,000 | 1,385 |
| 2008 | 48,283 | 2,799 | 30,869 | 18.77 | 216,000 | 1,534 |
| 2009 | 48,230 | 2,184 | 32,625 | 17.16 | 229,000 | 1,649 |
| 2010 | 47,220 | 1,770 | 33,005 | 19.86 | 239,000 | 1,710 |
| 2011 | 48,815 | 1,993 | 33,699 | 20.67 | 234,000 | 1,749 |
| 2012 | 50,208 | 1,824 | 33,559 | 26.56 | 248,000 | 1,745 |
| 2013 | 50,521 | 1,945 | 32,666 | 39.50 | 245,000 | 1,754 |
| 2014 | 53,417 | 2,270 | 32,732 | 47.84 | 262,000 | 1,832 |
| 2015 | 56,223 | 2,682 | 31,721 | 67.59 | 266,000 | 1,840 |
| 2016 | 59,074 | 2,534 | 31,266 | 71.22 | 270,000 | 1,857 |
| 2017 | 65,017 | 3,064 | 34,408 | 77.66 | 290,000 | 2,365 |
| 2018 | 68,619 | 3,436 | 35,291 | 96.71 | 310,000 | 2,394 |
Headquarters
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| lowe's home improvement |
Lowe's purchased the Wilkes Center in Wilkesboro, North Carolina, in 1998 to serve as the headquarters for the brand. In 2002, Lowe's gained direct ownership of the 440,000 square feet (41,000 m2) building after leasing out the land from the other 10 mall tenants.A year later, Lowe designed and moved the corporate headquarters to a new, 350-acre site in the Charlotte suburb of Mooresville, North Carolina.
The new complex contains five-story towers, and two seven-story ones. The building has two business wings and a main atrium; the atrium contains a food court, a five-story spiral staircase, and conference and reception areas. Underneath the headquarters building flows a 7 acre (2.8 ha) pool.
Lowe's maintained its old Wilkesboro office, where it employs over 2,400 employees. In 2011, Lowe's spent $10 million in real estate construction projects, including a full-service food court, coffee bar, fitness centre, and gating the entire property with a guardhouse extension.
Since the merger with Rona, Lowe's Corporations Canada has its headquarters in Boucherville, Je. Lowe's Canada was headquarters in Toronto , Ontario, prior to 2016.
In Mooresville and Wilkesboro, North Carolina, as well as Indianapolis, Indiana, Albuquerque, New Mexico and India, Lowe's runs customer service centres.
Lowe's unveiled on June 27 , 2019 a $153 million, 23-story tower in South End to be completed by 2020 and potentially house 2000 staff, 400 of whom will move from headquarters. North Carolina state offers $54 million in benefits after Lowe's fulfills certain targets.
Environmental record
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| lowes hardware |
From 2003 to 2010 Lowe's received eight consecutive Energy Star awards and four Energy Star Partner of the Year awards to teach customers on the benefits of energy efficiency.On 1 March 2010, Lowe's also became the first supermarket recipient of the Energy Star Sustained Excellence Award, acknowledging its commitment to lowering greenhouse gas emissions by selling energy-efficient goods and teaching customers and workers about the benefits of the Energy Star initiative.Lowe's issued a campaign in 2000 that said that all wood items produced would be sourced from rainforests.
Nevertheless, according to a 2006 study published by the Environmental Investigation Agency, Armstrong Flooring's wood used in flooring that Lowe's was marketing had come from the forests of the isolated Papua Province of Indonesia, where some logging was considered illegal.
According to the Telepak report, which was the primary basis of the EIA claims, over the last 18 months Armstrong conducted an independent audit of Kreasi's merbau suppliers, which found documents relating to the origins of the company's merbau logs in Papua, and on that basis Armstrong agreed to continue to trade in merbau supplied by Kreasi.The aforementioned research dates back to 2006 and Lowe's continues to assert that its wood products come from established sources; is grown and sold lawfully, and more
Racing sponsorships
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| Racing sponsorships |
In 1998 Lowe bought Charlotte Motor Speedway's naming rights in Charlotte, North Carolina, and the speedway changed the names to Lowe's Motor Speedway. Lowe 's extended naming rights by a year after the ten year naming rights had expired. Lowe 's lost naming rights after the one year contract expired, and the racetrack reverted to its original name as of the 2010 racing season.
The business was the principal sponsor of seven-time NASCAR Sprint Cup Series winner Jimmie Johnson in the No. 48 Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 and was a part-time sponsor of the former No. 5 Nationwide Series car; both cars are owned by Hendrick Motorsports.
Lowe's has been the sponsor of No. 31 Chevrolet for Richard Childress Racing driven by Mike Skinner and Robby Gordon from 1997 to 2001 previous to the new sponsorship contract with Hendrick Motorsports. Before the RCR contract, Lowe's had become No. 11 Ford 's main sponsor driven by Brett Bodine for Junior Johnson & Associates and then his own team, Brett Bodine Racing.
Some of the company's first forays into racing marketing came in 1979, when it sponsored the Rod Osterlund team's No. 2 Buick for the Talladega 500 in what was then known as the Winston Cup Series. David Pearson drived the car in that race, submitting to injured rookie Dale Earnhardt.
Lowe's will maintain intermittent car sponsorship over the next two decades until the aforementioned 1995 Bodine sponsorship. Lowe's revealed on March 14 , 2018 that it will cease sponsorship of the No. 48 car after the 2018 season and thereby terminate its participation in Motorsports.
In the American Le Mans Series, Lowe's also sponsored Fernandez Racing and formerly sponsored the Rolex Sports Car Championship team; in that championship, Lowe's sponsored No. 99 Gainsco Stallings Racing Pontiac in events where Johnson was driving.
Lowe's hired planner Marianne Cusato in 2006 to build and sell affordable house designs for the Gulf region hit by the hurricane. Lowe's is the preferred supplier for both the Lowe's Katrina Cottage plans and construction supplies. We deliver fast construction and affordability, as well as growth opportunities.In addition, they comply with all universal building standards and meet the hurricane standards. Lowe's eliminated the 2011 Katrina Cottage section.
Lowe's offers a wide range of Television and radio commercials. A small amount of numerous racing-inspired advertisements can be used and are mostly played beyond the coverage of tv events. Until 2010 when Ben Yannette replaced him, the voice of Gene Hackman could be heard on several television commercials for Lowe's