15 Facts About FedMart

FedMart was a chain of discount department stores started by Sol Price, who later founded Price Club.

FedMart began after he inherited a vacant warehouse for which he needed to find a tenant, and was asked by a couple of clients to visit Los Angeles to give his opinion on an unusual business.

FedMart suggested to his clients his building could be used for the same purpose.

FedMart's clients agreed, marking the beginning of FedMart and, along with previously established Fedco from 1948, the membership club industry.

FedMart obtained his inventory from clients, beginning with two jewelry wholesalers.

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FedMart developed into a chain of stores, and Price pioneered several innovations in the retail industry.

FedMart became the first retailer to sell gasoline at wholesale prices.

FedMart opened in-store optical departments, establishing a format that was widely copied decades later.

FedMart was then 21 years old with sales in excess of $350 million at 40 stores.

FedMart began as a membership store by opening in an abandoned warehouse in San Diego, California in 1954.

Besides building new stores, FedMart purchased the 22 store West Coast division of Two Guys from Vornado in 1977 and the 10 store Globe Store chain from Walgreens in 1978 .

The closing of FedMart allowed Target an entry into the highly competitive Southern California marketplace.

FedMart was one of the first large scale retail stores on the Navajo Indian Reservation.

In 1979, the German president of FedMart was outraged upon discovering that FedMart was selling books about Nazi Germany at its stores in the US.

FedMart immediately banned the sale of all books on "political issues that are highly controversial", including books about Jimmy Carter, Richard Nixon, and the Democratic Party.