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Marshalls is a chain of off-price department stores owned by TJX Companies. Its slogans are Your Surprise Is Waiting and Never Boring, Always Surprising. Marshalls stores average approximately 31,000 square feet in size.
Marshalls offers an ever-changing assortment of fashionable, brand name family apparel, home fashions and other merchandise such as toys. Marshalls differentiates itself from T.J. Maxx with a full line of family footwear and an expanded men's department, as well as The CUBE, a department specifically for juniors.
Operating 904 stores at the end of 2012, Marshalls continues to have significant store growth opportunities in markets across the U.S., as they continued to grow our customer base and broaden their demographic reach.
Marshalls and T.J. Maxx operate as sister stores, and share a similar footprint throughout the country. While the two operate at near-identical price points and have similar store layouts, Marshalls differentiates itself by featuring a larger emphasis on family footwear and larger men's and juniors departments.
History[]
Marshalls traces its history to 1956, when Alfred Marshall (February 28, 1919 – December 28, 2013) gathered a band of innovative entrepreneurs on the East Coast, including Bernard Goldston, Norman Barren, and Irving Blitt (Frank Estey and Bernard Ribas joined the entrepreneurs in 1960 by purchasing Bernard Goldston's shares), to collectively start up the "Brand Names For Less" concept. Contemplating the dual postwar phenomena of a boom in the economy and growth in the suburbs, Marshall and associates came upon a way to meet it profitably. Together, they opened a self-service department store in Beverly, Massachusetts, offering apparel and homewares at alluringly low prices. Additional floor space was "sublet" to offer customers shoes, hardware, and sporting goods from separate sellers, but the separate ownership of those departments was invisible to the shopper. The original store also had a soda fountain/grill... another sublet of floor space, the "A & M Luncheonette" (for Alice & Mickey Masters, the proprietors).
A Marshalls store in Rome, New York.
The concept proved extremely successful; 10 years later, Marshalls had become the leading off-price retail chain in the nation. Given the volatility of the American economy in the 1970s, with recession affecting the spending habits of most shoppers, the off-price industry gathered speed. By buying up manufacturers’ post-season, overrun, and close-out stock, Marshalls was able to offer fashionable, high-quality "designer" items at prices 20 to 60 percent less than those of the department stores.
In 1976, Marshalls was acquired by Melville Corporation (owner of CVS) and experienced tremendous growth from 1977 into the 1980s. By 1993, Marshalls had expanded throughout 42 states including Hawaii, and had opened several downtown locations. Marshalls was acquired by TJX in 1995, and together with T.J. Maxx, forms The Marmaxx Group, the largest off-price retailer of apparel and home fashions in the U.S.
Canada[]
Marshalls launched in Canada in March 2011, joining Winners and HomeSense as part of TJX Canada.
Marshalls, a leading off-price retailer in the U.S. and well known for brand names at prices generally 20%-60% below department and specialty store regular prices, offers TJX another growth vehicle in Canada.
In Canada, Marshalls offers brand name women's, men's and children's apparel, with an expanded family-footwear department and The CUBE, an exciting juniors department.
Marshalls operated 14 stores in Canada at 2012's year end, averaging approximately 32,000 square feet in size. We believe that in the long term, the Canadian provinces can support 90-100 Marshalls stores.