Walmart Inc. is an American multinational retail corporation that operates a chain of hypermarkets, discount department stores, and grocery stores in the United States, headquartered in Bentonville, Arkansas. The company was founded by brothers Sam and James "Bud" Walton in nearby Rogers, Arkansas in 1962 and incorporated under Delaware General Corporation Law on October 31, 1969. It also owns and operates Sam's Club retail warehouses.
H&R Block, Inc., or H&R Block, is an American tax preparation company operating in Canada, the United States, and Australia. The company was founded in 1955 by brothers Henry W. Bloch and Richard Bloch.
The Original Soupman was a chain of soup restaurants originally run by Iranian-American soup vendor Ali "Al" Yeganeh, modeled after Yeganeh's original restaurant Soup Kitchen International, which was a well-known soup restaurant at 259-A West 55th Street, in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. The restaurant was known for its strict rules amongst its customers.
Refund anticipation loan (RAL) is a short-term consumer loan in the United States provided by a third party against an expected tax refund for the duration it takes the tax authority to pay the refund. The loan term was usually about two to three weeks, related to the time it took the U.S. Internal Revenue Service to deposit refunds in electronic accounts. The loans were designed to make the refund available in as little as 24 hours. They were secured by a taxpayer's expected tax refund, and designed to offer customers quicker access to funds.
Cendant Corporation was an American provider of business and consumer services, primarily within the real estate and travel industries. In 2005 and 2006, it broke up and spun off or sold its constituent businesses. Although it was based in New York City, the majority of its headquarters employees were in Parsippany-Troy Hills, New Jersey.
Intuit Inc. is an American multinational business software company that specializes in financial software. The company is headquartered in Mountain View, California, and the CEO is Sasan Goodarzi. Intuit's products include the tax preparation application TurboTax, personal finance app Mint, the small business accounting program QuickBooks, the credit monitoring service Credit Karma, and email marketing platform Mailchimp. As of 2019, more than 95% of its revenues and earnings come from its activities within the United States.
Giant Eagle, Inc. and stylized as giant eagle) is an American supermarket chain with stores in Pennsylvania, Ohio, West Virginia, Indiana, and Maryland. The company was founded in 1918 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and incorporated on August 31, 1931. Supermarket News ranked Giant Eagle 21st on the "Top 75 North American Food Retailers" based on sales of $11 billion. In 2021, it was the 36th-largest privately held company, as determined by Forbes. Based on 2005 revenue, Giant Eagle is the 49th-largest retailer in the United States. As of summer 2014, the company had approximately $9.9 billion in annual sales. As of fall 2023, Giant Eagle, Inc. had 496 stores across the portfolio: 211 supermarkets 8 standalone pharmacies, 274 fuel station/convenience stores under the GetGo banner, and three standalone car wash under the WetGo banner. The company is headquartered in an office park in the Pittsburgh suburb of O'Hara Township.
CUC (Comp-U-Card) International Inc. was a membership-based consumer services conglomerate with travel, shopping, auto, dining, home improvement and financial services offered to more than 60 million customers worldwide based in Stamford, Connecticut, US, and founded in 1973 by Kirk Shelton and Walter Forbes. In 1998, it became involved in a Securities and Exchange Commission investigation into what, at the time, was the biggest accounting scandal in corporate history.
Budget Rent a Car System, Inc. is an American car rental company that was founded in 1958 in Los Angeles, California by Morris Mirkin. Budget is a subsidiary of the Avis Budget Group, with its operations headquartered in Parsippany, New Jersey.
Coldwell Banker Real Estate LLC is an American real estate franchise owned by Anywhere Real Estate, with headquarters in Madison, New Jersey. It was founded in 1906 in San Francisco, and has approximately 3000 offices in 49 countries and territories. It publishes an annual house price guide, Home Listing Report.
Tax preparation is the process of preparing tax returns, often income tax returns, often for a person other than the taxpayer, and generally for compensation. Tax preparation may be done by the taxpayer with or without the help of tax preparation software and online services. Tax preparation may also be done by a licensed professional such as an attorney, certified public accountant or enrolled agent, or by an unlicensed tax preparation business. Because United States income tax laws are considered to be complicated, many taxpayers seek outside assistance with taxes.
Franchise Group, Inc. is an American privately-held holding company that acquires and manages mainly franchise companies. It owns brands in various retail industries including American Freight, Buddy's Home Furnishings, The Vitamin Shoppe, Pet Supplies Plus, Sylvan Learning and Badcock Home Furniture.
Liberty Tax, is a chain of franchise and company-owned locations that provide tax preparation services. It is known for its wavers, people in Statue of Liberty costumes and Uncle Sam costumes, used as a form of guerrilla marketing. It is the third largest institutional tax preparation service provider in the United States and second largest in Canada.
John T. Hewitt is an American entrepreneur, the co-founder of Jackson Hewitt, sole founder of Liberty Tax Service and now CEO of ATAX. As of late 2006 Hewitt served as CEO, chairman of the board and president of the latter. Together these companies account for more than 10,000 tax preparation offices in the United States and Canada. In addition, John Hewitt was a pioneer in the development and use of specialized tax-preparation software, which is now the industry's standard practice.
The Mills at Jersey Gardens, originally and also still colloquially called Jersey Gardens, is a two-level indoor outlet mall in Elizabeth, New Jersey. The mall opened on October 21, 1999, and is the largest outlet mall in New Jersey, and much closer to New York City than its largest outlet mall competitor, Woodbury Common.
Instant Tax Service was, until a federal court ordered its closure as part of a fraud lawsuit, based out of Dayton, Ohio, and specialized in tax preparation, electronic filing, and refund anticipation loan services.
Linens 'n Things was a big-box retailer specializing in home textiles, housewares, and decorative home accessories. Based in Clifton, New Jersey, the chain operated 571 stores in 47 U.S. states and six Canadian provinces, and had 7,300 employees as of December 2006. The company's business strategy was "to offer a broad selection of high quality, brand name home furnishings merchandise at exceptional everyday values, provide superior guest service, and maintain low operating costs."
Henry R. Silverman is an American entrepreneur and private equity investor. Silverman is best known for his role in building Cendant Corporation into a multibillion-dollar business services company that provided car rentals, travel reservation services as well as real estate brokerage services and was also the largest franchisor of hotels globally.
Sears Holdings Corporation was an American holding company headquartered in Hoffman Estates, Illinois. It was the parent company of the chain stores Kmart and Sears and was founded after the former purchased the latter in 2005. It was the 20th-largest retailing company in the United States in 2015. It filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on October 15, 2018, and sold its assets to ESL Investments in 2019. The new owner moved Sears assets to its newly formed subsidiary Transform Holdco LLC and after that, Sears Holdings Corporation was closed.
Transform SR Brands LLC is an American privately held company formed on February 11, 2019, to acquire some of the assets of Sears Holdings Corporation. The new company is owned by ESL Investments. Following the Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing of Sears Holdings on October 15, 2018, Transformco purchased the surviving assets owned by Sears Holdings for $5.2 billion.
