Williams-Sonoma, Inc. operates as a specialty retailer of home products. It offers culinary and serving equipment, including cookware, cookbooks, cutlery, informal dinnerware, glassware, table linens, specialty foods, and cooking ingredients; and bridal and gift items under the Williams-Sonoma brand name. The company also provides home furnishing categories, including furniture, textiles, decorative accessories, lighting, and tabletop items under West Elm brand; bed and bath products under Pottery Barn brand; and children’s furnishings and accessories under Pottery Barn Kids brand name. Williams-Sonoma, Inc. sells its home products through five retail store concepts, which include Williams-Sonoma, Pottery Barn, Pottery Barn Kids, West Elm, and Williams-Sonoma Home; seven direct-mail catalogs that comprise Williams-Sonoma, Pottery Barn, Pottery Barn Kids, Pottery Barn Bed and Bath, PBteen, West Elm, and Williams-Sonoma Home; and six e-commerce Websites, which consist of williams-sonoma.com, potterybarn.com, potterybarnkids.com, pbteen.com, westelm.com, and wshome.com. As of January 31, 2010, it operated 610 retail stores, including 259 Williams-Sonoma, 199 Pottery Barn, 87 Pottery Barn Kids, 36 West Elm, 11 Williams-Sonoma Home, and 18 Outlet stores located in 44 states of the United States; Washington, D.C.; Canada; and Puerto Rico. The company was founded in 1956 and is headquartered in San Francisco, California.

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.

Founded by Tom Singh in 1969, New Look was taken private in 2004 by the private equity firms Apax Partners and Permira, who've twice failed to sell it. Growing as fast as its teen customers, New Look sells apparel, lingerie, shoes, and accessories at about 660 New Look stores in the UK and Ireland and 300-plus Mim shops in France and Belgium. Most New Look shops are in the UK but the chain has a growing presence in Ireland, France, Belgium, the Netherlands, and now Russia. The retailer also sells apparel online. New Look targets tweens (pre-teens), teen girls, and their mums (if they're hip) with value-priced clothing. Most of its products are private label and the stores sell plus-sized and maternity apparel.

Bernecker's Nursery, Inc. was founded in the 1960s by Leo Bernecker. Bernecker's Nursery has it made in the shade. Bernecker's Nursery raises and distributes shade-acclimated Chamaedorea Seifrizii palms and other tropical indoor plants. The company nurtures the Chamaedorea Seifrizii, which has reed-like stems and feathery fronds, to thrive in either artificial or natural light. Other indoor tropical plants available from Bernecker's are aglaonemas, dracaenas, ficus, rhapis, and spathiphyllums. Customers include interiorscapers and nurseries in the US, Canada, Latin America, and other areas.

Sierra Trading Post, Inc. was founded in 1986 by Keith Richardson. Sierra Trading Post is counting on you trading in your hard-earned cash for a pair of waterproof hiking boots or a brand new wetsuit. The company sells discounted men's and women's brand-name apparel, outdoor gear, footwear, and home decor through four retail locations in Idaho, Nevada, and Wyoming; about 10 catalog titles; and its website. It buys overstock and closeout items from about 1,000 manufacturers, including Columbia, The North Face, Timberland, ECCO, Dr. Martens, and Birkenstock, and sells them to consumers at 35%-70% off of the original retail price. Sierra Trading Post's print catalogs have an annual circulation of about 60 million.

Claire's Accessories UK, like its US parent company Claire's Stores, sells costume jewelry, handbags, and hair accessories largely to the 7- to 14-year-old set through about 430 stores throughout England and Ireland. It also markets accessories to late teens and twenty-somethings through its Icing stores. The company's stores are primarily located in shopping malls and on high streets. Claire's Stores opened its first shop in the UK in 1996 and has since extended its reach to other European countries, including Austria, France, Germany, Spain, and Switzerland.

Restoration Hardware sells upscale home furnishings, hardware, bathware, garden products, and decorative items through more than 100 retail and outlet stores in 30 states, the District of Columbia, and Canada. It also markets products through its catalogs and e-commerce sites. Restoration Hardware's assortment of home and office furniture is supplemented in part by its subsidiary The Michaels Furniture Company. Founded in 1980 by former chairman Stephen Gordon, Restoration Hardware was acquired for $175 million by private equity firms Catterton Partners and Tower Three Partners in 2008.

Building in the American heartland builds business for Amerhart. The company distributes hardware, lumber, and building materials, including decking, insulation, plywood, shingles, and siding through locations in Green Bay, Milwaukee, Sun Prairie, and West Salem, Wisconsin, as well as one in Perkin, Illinois. Amerhart also offers services, including floor plan design. The company's vendors include Ply Gem Industries, Louisiana Pacific, and CertainTeed. Tracing its roots back to 1940, Amerhart takes its name from the 1963 acquisition of American Millwork and Supply by Hartman Wholesale.

Leon's Furniture Ltd. sells home furnishings, bedding, appliances, and electronics through about 65 company-owned and franchised stores throughout Canada and online. Its store banners include Shop for Furniture, Shop for Appliances, and Shop for Electronics. Its stores carry such brands as Frigidaire, LG, Panasonic, Samsung, Sealy, Simmons, and Whirlpool, among others. Leon's also wholesales appliances to builders, landlords, and retailers through its Canada Appliances division. Ablan Leon founded the company in 1909; more than a century later, it is still owned and operated by the Leon family.

Brookstone is a nationwide specialty retailer offering an assortment of consumer products that are functional in purpose, distinctive in quality and design and not widely available from other retailers. Brookstone first introduced itself to the world in a small classified ad selling "hard-to-find tools" in Popular Mechanics Magazine. The year was 1965. From the beginning, quality of product, quality of service, and quality of people have been a hallmark of Brookstone. The first catalog consisted of 24 black-and-white pages, with detailed, no-nonsense information on features, capabilities, measurements, materials and anything that would help the customer with his or her buying decision. As Brookstone's catalog success grew, its operations expanded. In 1973, Brookstone opened its first retail store in Peterborough, New Hampshire, where an unsolicited walk-in trade quickly developed. Today, Brookstone manages operations through its headquarters in Merrimack, New Hampshire, and in its Distribution Center and Customer Service Department (web, mail and telephone orders) in Mexico, Missouri. Meanwhile, the Company currently operates more than 300 retail stores throughout the United States and Puerto Rico, primarily in premium shopping malls, lifestyle centers and the nation's busiest airports, and opens 10 to 15 new stores each year. Originally a catalog company, Brookstone today operates a multifaceted Direct-Marketing business that includes catalogs, e-mail and affiliate marketing, and an online site offering hundreds more products than are available in our retail and airport stores. From the start Brookstone created a fun, interactive shopping experience. At our stores customers are encouraged to try products out for true, hands-on shopping. Every visit to Brookstone is an opportunity to discover new and ingenious items of superior quality—all in a friendly environment of customer service and integrity that simply can't be found anywhere else.

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