Properties
Menu
From TheAtlantic.com
At the Trader Joe’s I frequent here in Washington, D.C., there is a painting of a teary-eyed John Boehner on one wall and a WPA-style mural of protesters outside the Supreme Court demanding better cheap wine on another. At the Trader Joe’s in Philadelphia's Center City, each checkout line is named for a local thoroughfare: Race St., Market St., Walnut St. And back in Northern California, the Trader Joe’s two blocks from the house I grew up in has a painting of a historic stretch of downtown. In every city I’ve lived in, I’ve marveled at how Trader Joe’s can feel at once local and national.
How does it manage to pull off that duality? With a lot of calculation. Trader Joe's started out as a small chain in Southern California in the '60s, and its ambitions remained small until the early '90s, when the company began eyeing the East Coast. Executives were wary, though, that the chain's distinctly Southern Californian warmth would get lost in transit. That concern was routinely headed off under the guidance of CEO John Shields, who started in that role in 1989, when the chain had only 27 stores. By the time he retired in 2001, there were 158 Trader Joe's locations, revenues had increased roughly 15-fold, and the brand's quirky novelty hadn't faded. Shields died late last month at the age of 82.
For complete article, click here.
