Hechinger
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| Former type | Private |
|---|---|
| Industry | Retail |
| Founded | 1911 (as home improvement retail) 2004 (as online retailer) |
| Defunct | 1999 (as home improvement retail) 2009 (as online retailer) |
| Headquarters | Landover, Maryland |
| Products | Lumber, tools, hardware, garden supplies & plants |
| Website | None |
Hechinger, mistakenly called Hechinger's by many customers[citation needed] was a chain of home improvement retail stores headquartered in Landover, Maryland outside Washington, D.C., and an online retailer owned by Home Decor Products.
John Hechinger, Sr. helped pioneer the do it yourself industry; from a single hardware store established by his father (Sidney) in 1911, Hechinger grew to a 64-store chain by the time it acquired Virginia Beach, Virginia-based HQ Home Quarters Warehouse in December 1987 for $66 million. In the 1980s it underwent a massive expansion of both HQ and the Hechinger Co. divisions, opening big-box stores to better compete with rivals Home Depot and Lowe's.
The company continued to lose money in the 1980s, however. The Hechinger family sold the company to Los Angeles investors Leonard Green & Partners for $507 million in July 1997, and the management launched new, smaller concept stores called Better Spaces and Wye River Hardware & Home searching for a niche. In September, Hechinger was merged with San Antonio, Texas-based Builders Square, formerly owned by Kmart.
After several rounds of store closings, Hechinger Co. filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on June 11, 1999, but the reorganization failed. That September, Hechinger's assets were liquidated, including its 117 remaining stores.
In 2004, Home Decor Products bought the Hechinger brand name and opened an online retailer the following year [1], which sells the same products as the former brand. On February 5, 2009, it was announced that the site would shut down and Hechinger will no longer sell tools. The site closed shortly thereafter.
Hechinger was one of the first sponsors of network television news in the early 1950s, when television was in its infancy. Their sponsorship of the 11PM newcast at TV station WTOP in Washington, DC, was a first, according to Walter Cronkite (an anchor of those broadcasts) in his autobiography A Reporter's Life.
[edit] References
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This article includes a list of references, related reading or external links, but its sources remain unclear because it lacks inline citations. Please improve this article by introducing more precise citations. (March 2009) |
- Golubovskis, George. "Hechinger no longer our hometown store," Washington Business Journal, July 18, 1997
- "Post 200: Hechinger Co.," The Washington Post, April 28, 1997
- ^ Kelly, John, "A Familiar Brand, Reborn in Pixels", The Washington Post, March 28, 2006
- Companies established in 1911
- Companies established in 2004
- Re-established companies
- Companies based in Prince George's County, Maryland
- Companies disestablished in 1999
- Companies disestablished in 2009
- Defunct retail companies of the United States
- Home improvement retailers of the United States
- Defunct companies based in Maryland
