Relax The Back

Last updated
Relax The Back
Company type Retail
IndustryProvides education and products aiding in the relief and prevention of back pain
Founded Austin, Texas, U.S. (1984 (1984))
Headquarters,
Number of locations
More than 70 stores nationwide (2024) at 2024-09-05
Area served
United States
Products Zero-Gravity Recliners, Tempur-Pedic Mattresses, Pillows, Office chairs, Massage chairs, Lumbar supports, Exercise balls, Inversion Tables

Relax The Back is a chain of retail stores of back pain relief and wellness products with more than 70 locations in the United States.

Relax the Back at Wayside Commons
in Burlington, Massachusetts Relax the Back at Wayside Commons, Burlington MA.jpg
Relax the Back at Wayside Commons
in Burlington, Massachusetts

History

The first Relax The Back store opened in Austin, Texas in 1984. In 1987, an entrepreneur named Virginia Rogers purchased the original store and packaged the business into a franchise format. [1] The first franchise was opened in San Antonio in 1989 by Coby Dietrick, a former professional basketball player with the San Antonio Spurs. [2] In 1996, having grown the chain to 59 stores, Rogers sold the company to a franchisee, Dairl Johnson, for $6 million. [1] Johnson continued to develop the company's independent franchising model. [3] Relax The Back corporate offices are currently located in Long Beach, California.

As early as 1998, US News noted that the four major back-related stores, Healthy Back Store, Better Back Store, Relax the Back, and JoAnne's Bed & Back Shops, had a combined business of $75 million. [4]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Saks Fifth Avenue</span> Multinational department store chain founded in the United States

Saks Fifth Avenue is an American luxury brand associated with Saks, a luxury ecommerce platform, and SFA stores, a chain of high-end department stores in North America. Founded by Andrew Saks, it is headquartered in New York City. The original Saks opened in the F Street shopping district of Washington, D.C. in 1867. Saks expanded into Manhattan with its Herald Square store in 1902 and flagship store on Fifth Avenue in 1924. The chain was acquired by Tennessee-based Proffitt's, Inc. in 1998, and Saks, Inc. was acquired by the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) in 2013.

7-Eleven, Inc. is a convenience store chain, headquartered in Irving, Texas. The chain was founded in 1927 as an ice house storefront in Dallas. It was named Tote'm Stores between 1928 and 1946. After Ito-Yokado, a Japanese supermarket chain and the parent company of Seven-Eleven Japan, acquired a 70% stake in the company in 1991, the company became a wholly owned subsidiary of Seven-Eleven Japan in November 2005. The chain is owned by Japanese company Seven & I Holdings through Seven-Eleven Japan Co., Ltd.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Whataburger</span> American fast food restaurant chain

Whataburger is an American regional fast food restaurant chain, headquartered and based in San Antonio, Texas, that specializes in hamburgers. Founded by Harmon Dobson and Paul Burton, it opened its first restaurant in Corpus Christi, Texas in 1950. Family-owned by the Dobsons until 2019, the chain is now managed by the private equity firm BDT & MSD Partners; the Dobson family still holds a small stake.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Blockbuster (retailer)</span> American video rental corporation

Blockbuster is an American multimedia brand and former rental store chain. The business was founded by David Cook in 1985 as a single home video rental shop, but later became a public store chain featuring video game rentals, DVD-by-mail, streaming, video on demand, and cinema theater. The logo was designed by Lee Dean at the Rominger Agency. The company expanded internationally throughout the 1990s. At its peak in 2004, Blockbuster employed 84,300 people worldwide and operated 9,094 stores.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Circle K</span> American chain of convenience stores

Circle K Stores, Inc. is an American chain of convenience stores headquartered in Tempe, Arizona, and owned by Alimentation Couche-Tard, Inc., based in Laval, Quebec, Canada. Founded in 1951 in El Paso, Texas, the company filed for bankruptcy protection in 1990 and went through several owners, before being acquired by Alimentation Couche-Tard in 2003. As of February 2020, Circle K has 9,799 stores in North America, 2,697 stores in Europe, and an additional 2,380 stores operating under franchise agreements worldwide.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">JCPenney</span> American department store chain

Penney OpCo LLC, doing business as JCPenney and often abbreviated JCP, is an American department store chain that operates 663 stores across 49 U.S. states and Puerto Rico. Departments inside JCPenney stores include Men's, Women's, Boys', Girls', Baby, Bedding, Home, Fine Jewelry, Shoes, Lingerie, JCPenney Salon, JCPenney Beauty, as well as leased departments such as Seattle's Best Coffee, US Vision optical centers, and Lifetouch portrait studios.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">99 Ranch Market</span> Taiwanese-American supermarket chain

99 Ranch Market is an American supermarket chain owned by Tawa Supermarket Inc., which is based in Buena Park, California. 99 Ranch has 58 stores in the U.S., primarily in California, with other stores in Nevada, Oregon, Washington, New Jersey, Texas, Maryland, Massachusetts, Arizona, and Virginia. The company also started offering shopping via its website in 2014. In February 2021, the company also launched their mobile app for grocery delivery.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pier 1 Imports</span> US imported goods retailer

Pier 1 Imports, Inc., is an online retailer and former Fort Worth, Texas-based retail chain specializing in imported home furnishings and decor, particularly furniture, table-top items, decorative accessories, and seasonal decor. It was publicly traded on the New York Stock Exchange under ticker PIR. In January 2020, Pier 1 had over 1,000 physical stores throughout the United States and Canada. Pier 1 filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on February 17, 2020, and on May 19, 2020, announced it was asking the bankruptcy court to close all stores, due in large part to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Foley's was a regional chain of department stores owned by Federated Department Stores, later owned by May Department Stores (1988–2005) and headquartered in Downtown Houston, Texas. On August 30, 2005, the division was dissolved and operation of the stores was assumed by Federated's Macy's West and Macy's South divisions. Foley's operated stores in Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, Oklahoma, Texas and Louisiana. On September 9, 2006 Foley's and all the regional May Co. stores names were phased out and rebranded as Macy's.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">H-E-B</span> American supermarket chain

H-E-B Grocery Company, LP, is an American privately held supermarket chain based in San Antonio, Texas, with more than 380 stores throughout the U.S. state of Texas and the country of Mexico. The company also operates Central Market, an upscale organic and fine foods retailer. As of 2022, the company had a total revenue of US$38.9 billion. H-E-B ranked number 6 on Forbes' 2022 list of "America's Largest Private Companies". The company also ranked number 3 on Forbes' 2024 list of "Customer Experience All-Stars." H-E-B was named Retailer of the Year in 2010 by Progressive Grocer. Supermarket News ranks H-E-B 13th on the list of "Top 75 North American Food Retailers" by sales. Based on 2019 revenues, H-E-B is the 19th-largest retailer in the United States. It donates 5% of pretax profits to charity. The official mascot of H-E-B is named H-E-Buddy, an anthropomorphic brown grocery bag, with multiple grocery items emerging from the top.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Schlotzsky's</span> American restaurant franchise chain

Schlotzsky's is an American franchise chain of restaurants, specializing in sandwiches and pizza. The company is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia. Schlotzsky's has more than 330 franchised and company-owned locations throughout the United States. Most locations are in the south and southwestern United States, but the company is expanding into areas across the country, particularly the north and southeast.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Joske's</span> American department store chain

Joske's, founded by German immigrant Julius Joske in 1867, was a department store chain originally based in San Antonio, Texas. In December 1928, Hahn Department Stores acquired the company along with the Titche-Goettinger department store of Dallas, and three years later Hahn became part of Allied Stores. Allied was taken over by Campeau in 1986, and Campeau in turn sold the Joske's chain in 1987 to Dillard's. All Joske's stores were then quickly converted into Dillard's locations.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">FedMart</span> American discount department store chain

FedMart was a chain of discount department stores started by Sol Price, who later founded Price Club. Originally a discount department store open to government employees paying a $2 per family membership fee, FedMart earned four times more than its investors had projected in its first year. Over the next 20 years, FedMart grew to include 45 stores, mostly in California, and the Southwest in a chain that generated over $300 million in annual sales. The business expanded to several states in the Southwest United States. Many stores were previous White Front or Two Guys locations. Price later sold two-thirds of the chain to Hugo Mann, a German retail chain, in 1975 and was forced out of his leadership position the following year. FedMart went out of business in 1982.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hastings Entertainment</span> Defunct American retailer

Hastings Entertainment was an American retail chain that sold books, movies, music, and video games and functioned as a video rental shop. As of 2016 it had 126 superstores, which were mainly located in the South Central United States, Rocky Mountain States, and in parts of the Great Plains and Midwestern states. Hastings Entertainment stores were also located in many college towns in the U.S. Hastings Entertainment was headquartered in Amarillo, Texas.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">World Market (store)</span> Retail store chain in the United States

World Market, formerly Cost Plus World Market, is an American chain of specialty/import retail stores, selling home furniture, decor, curtains, rugs, gifts, apparel, coffee, wine, craft beer, and international food products. The brand's original name came from the initial concept, since abandoned, of selling items for "cost plus 10%". The company was owned by Bed Bath & Beyond from 2012 to 2021, and is currently headquartered in Alameda, California.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Academy Sports + Outdoors</span> American sporting goods store chain

Academy Sports + Outdoors is an American sporting-goods store chain with corporate offices in the Katy Distribution Center in unincorporated western Harris County, Texas, United States, near Katy and west of Houston. For 74 years, it was a privately held company owned by the Gochman family, until its May 2011 acquisition by Kohlberg Kravis Roberts. On October 2020, it was listed on NASDAQ.

FuncoLand was an American video game retailer based in Eden Prairie, Minnesota, that specialized in selling new and used video game software. It is considered the first major video game retailer to allow consumers to sell and trade used video games. The chain's parent company Funco Inc. was established in the home of David R. Pomije in 1988, initially as a leaser of video games to video stores, and then as a mail-order business specializing in used video games. Upon the success of this venture, Pomije moved Funco to a Minneapolis warehouse, and began opening FuncoLand retail outlets nationwide.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Conn's</span> American furniture, mattress, electronics and appliance store chain

Conn's, Inc. is an American furniture, mattress, electronics and appliance store chain headquartered in The Woodlands, Texas, United States. The chain has stores in Alabama, Arizona, Colorado, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, Nevada, Florida, New Mexico, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and Virginia. Within Texas, Conn's has stores in Greater Houston, the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex, Greater San Antonio, Greater El Paso, Greater Corpus Christi, Southeast Texas, and South Texas.

Oshman's Sporting Goods Inc. was a sporting goods retailer in the United States. Their headquarters were in East End, Houston, Texas. It operated traditional sporting goods stores and Oshman's Supersports USA megastores.

National Convenience Stores Incorporated is a convenience store company headquartered in Houston, Texas. Its primary subsidiary, Stop-N-Go Foods Inc., is/was the company controlling the convenience stores.

References

  1. 1 2 R. Michelle Breyer, "Largest Retail Franchise Devoted to Back Problems Sold for $6 Million." Austin American-Statesman , reprinted by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News , September 7, 1996
  2. Meena Thiruvengadam, "Former Texas basketball star sells furniture business after franchise dispute." San Antonio Express-News , March 10, 2005.
  3. Neil Cavuto, "Interview With the Relax The Back CEO", Cavuto Business Report , February 25, 1998.
  4. U.S. News & World Report. U.S. News Publishing Corporation. 1998. p. 194.