Bi-Mart Corporation retailer operates about 70 general merchandise membership stores throughout Oregon, Washington, and Idaho.(About 20 are in the Portland area.) Just $5 buys a lifetime membership to the deep-discount chain, which has enrolled more than 1 million members to date. Stores offer automotive departments, clothing and shoes, food and alcohol, housewares, full-service pharmacies, and photo departments, with a focus on national brands. A pioneer in membership-based retail, Bi-Mart was started in 1955 by a group of investors in Yakima, Washington. The firm was bought by CEO Marty Smith and other senior managers from Rite Aid Corp. in 1997. Today, the company is employee-owned.

The company sells mattresses, bed bases, and other bedroom furnishings through a number of retail chains in Europe. The company operates some 960 stores located across Austria, Germany, the Netherlands, Spain, and Switzerland. Beter Bed's retail brands include Matrazen Concord, Beter Bed, DBC, El Gigante del Colchón, and Slaapgenoten/Dormaël Slaapkamers. Each chain maintains its own unique retail concept, from discount furnishings to high-end bedroom accoutrements. The company acquired Spanish retailer El Gigante Del Colchón in 2005.

Gordmans, Inc. operates as a low price retailer. It offers home fashion products, such as wall decors, frames, candles, luggage, bath and bedding products, furniture, home accents, and kitchen products. The company also provides accessories, including fragrances, handbags and wallets, sleepwear, intimate apparels, jewelry, belts, and scarves and hats. In addition, it offers shorts and capris, dresses, tops and blouses, skirts, swim shops, knit tops, sportswear, casuals, socks, polos, and outerwear. The company was formerly known as Richman Gordman ½ Price Stores, Inc. and changed its name to Gordmans, Inc. in 1996. Gordmans, Inc. was founded in 1915 and is based in Omaha, Nebraska. The company has store locations in Arkansas, Colorado, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Tennessee, and Wisconsin.

Lund Food Holdings has been adding pharmacies to many of its stores. The grocer also operates an online shopping and home delivery service.Lund Food Holdings operates about 20 Lunds and Byerly's upscale grocery markets in the Twin Cities area of Minnesota. The company took its present form in 1997 with the merger of Lunds and Byerly's. Both chains specialize in gourmet, high-quality foods, with locations offering artisan breads, bakeries, a line of organic foods and natural products, wine stores, florists, catering services, housewares, cooking demos, and community meeting rooms. Byerly's also runs a culinary school out of one of its stores. Through a partnership with Minnetonka-based PrairieStone Pharmacy.

Kole Imports keeps America's dollar stores well stocked with trinkets and treasures. The firm wholesales everything from automobile accessories to zippers, which is attractively packaged by in-house artists to ensure a similar look for all of the merchandise. Products are sold primarily to other wholesalers and dollar and discount stores. Kole Imports' warehouse includes a 6,000-sq.-ft. showroom designed to look like a dollar store, allowing potential customers to browse the merchandise. The company was founded by brothers (and co-presidents) Rob and Danny Kole in 1982.

Focus (DIY) Limited company is owned by US investment firm Cerberus Capital Management. Focus (DIY) Limited has its sights fixed on weekend warriors. The company markets a range of products for do-it-yourselfers engaged in light home improvement and gardening projects, including power tools, hardware, appliances, decking and flooring, contemporary home and patio furniture, garden buildings, and plants and seeds. Focus sells its merchandise through about 180 stores in the UK and Ireland, as well as through its Web site. The site also offers guides, price lists, and calculators for DIY projects.

Sur La Table, Inc sells appliances, bakeware, cookbooks, housewares, specialty foods, and other goodies for professional and home chefs from about 80 stores in some 30 states, a website, and catalogs that make foodies drool. For customers who aren't sure how to best use the Le Creuset casserole dish, Cuisinart food processor, or Chef's Choice waffle maker, the company offers cooking classes and cookbook signing events in many of its stores. Founded in 1972 at Seattle's famous Pike's Place Market, Sur La Table is owned jointly by the Behnke family, including its chairman Carl Behnke, and private investor Freeman Spogli.

Grupo Gigante has the tiendas SuperPrecio discount convenience store format and largest retail brand, with more than 180 locations in central and northern Mexico. It also sells furniture at about half a dozen Home Store locations in Mexico and, through a long-term joint venture, Office Depot de Mexico, it offers office supplies at roughly 200 Office Depot stores in Mexico, Columbia, and Central America. Catering largely to families, Gigante runs more than 80 Toks casual dining restaurants and coffee shops. Gigante Grupo Inmobilario is the firm's real estate development arm.

Charles Hyde and David Vredenburg founded the employee-owned firm in 1930. It takes its name from a combination of its founders' names.Give Hy-Vee a high five for being one of the largest privately owned US supermarket chains, despite serving some modestly sized towns in the Midwest. The company runs more than 200 Hy-Vee supermarkets in eight Midwestern states: Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, South Dakota, and Wisconsin. About half of its stores are in Iowa, as are most of its two dozen Hy-Vee drugstores. It distributes products to its stores through several subsidiaries, including Lomar Distributing (specialty foods) and Perishable Distributors of Iowa (fresh foods).

DSW Inc., together with its subsidiaries, operates as a footwear specialty retailer in the United States. It offers dress, casual, and athletic footwear for women and men, as well as accessories, handbags, and hosiery. DSW Inc. also sells shoes and accessories through dsw.com. As of January 30, 2010, it operated 305 DSW shoe stores; and 356 leased shoe departments for other retailers. DSW Inc. was formerly known as Shonac Corporation and changed its name to DSW Inc. in February 2005. DSW Inc. was incorporated in 1969 and is based in Columbus, Ohio. As of January 31, 2009, DSW Inc. operated as a subsidiary of Retail Ventures, Inc.

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