Duluth Holdings Inc., which primarily sells goods through its Duluth Trading Company brand, is an American

workwear Workwear is clothing worn for work, especially work that involves manual labour. Often those employed within trade industries elect to be outfitted in workwear because it is built to provide durability and safety. The workwear clothing industry i ...

and accessories company.

History

Founding

Originally founded by two brothers, Bob and Dave Fierek, as Portable Products, Inc. in 1989, the company then primarily focused on those working in construction and a tool accessory known as the "Bucket Boss". The business grew to incorporate more tool accessories and storage equipment in a catalog, under the Portable Products banner, with the first headquarters being established on a barge in

Duluth, Minnesota , settlement_type = City , nicknames = Twin Ports (with Superior), Zenith City , motto = , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top: urban Duluth skyline; Minnesota ...

soon after. By 1993, the catalog was expanded and entitled ''Duluth Trading Co.''

Expansion

Duluth Trading Company store interior, Wixom, Michigan

In the mid-1990s, the company switched hands, purchased by

Fiskars Fiskars Group (also known as Fiskars Oyj Abp or Fiskars Corporation, and until 1998 as Fiskars Oy Ab) is a Finnish group company. The company has its roots in the village of Fiskars, Finland, Fiskars (in the town of Raseborg, about west of Helsi ...

. In 2000 it was sold again, this time to Gempler's, and moved its headquarters to

Belleville, Wisconsin Belleville is a village in Dane and Green counties in the U.S. state of Wisconsin. The population was 2,491 at the 2020 census. Of this, 1,909 were in Dane County, and 582 were in Green County. The Dane County portion of Belleville is part of the ...

. The company created a successful line of shirts called "Longtail T Shirts" in 2002 which were designed to get rid of

plumber's crack Buttock cleavage is minor exposure of the buttocks and the intergluteal cleft between them, often because of low-rise pants. The ''crena'' is a formal term for the cleft between the buttocks. History When faced with indecency issues back in t ...

. Gempler's was sold in 2003 to

Lab Safety Supply W. W. Grainger, Inc. is an American Fortune 500 industrial supply company founded in 1927 in Chicago by William W. (Bill) Grainger. He founded the company in order to provide consumers with access to a consistent supply of motors. The company ...

and the owners retained Duluth Trading Company. Two years later in 2005, the first women's catalog was released. In 2011, Duluth Trading Company aired its first nationwide ads featuring an angry beaver. Duluth Trading Company's parent, Duluth Holdings, went public in 2015. During the

retail apocalypse A retail apocalypse is the closing of numerous brick-and-mortar retail stores, especially those of large chains worldwide. It began around 2010, and was severely exacerbated by the mandatory closures during the COVID-19 pandemic. In 2017, over ...

of the mid-2010s when many physical stores were closing, Duluth Trading Company had outperformed their own expectations and continued to open new locations throughout the United States. Due to its rapid rate of expansion, Duluth Trading Company saw lower revenues in 2017. There are 31 stores as of December 8, 2017, and there are plans for opening 15 more that year. The company will open its first store in the

New York Metropolitan Area The New York metropolitan area, also commonly referred to as the Tri-State area, is the largest metropolitan area in the world by urban landmass, at , and one of the most populous urban agglomerations in the world. The vast metropolitan area ...

at The Ramsey Square Shopping Center in

Ramsey, New Jersey Ramsey is a borough in Bergen County, New Jersey, United States. It is a suburb of New York City, located northwest of Midtown Manhattan. As of the 2010 United States Census, the borough's population was 14,473,luge team. In June 2022, the company was named title sponsor of the Cure Bowl, a postseason college football

bowl game In North America, a bowl game is one of a number of post-season college football games that are primarily played by teams belonging to the NCAA's Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS). For most of its history, the Division I Bowl Subdivi ...

References

External links

*{{Commons category-inline, Duluth Trading Company Retail companies based in Wisconsin 1989 establishments in Minnesota Clothing retailers of the United States Retail companies established in 1989 American companies established in 1989