Joe Coulombe's idea: Why not cater to the better-educated, better-traveled — but still modestly salaried — class of customer?
Trader Joe's founder Joe Coulombe, seen around 1985 in Pasadena, Calif., died Friday at the age of 89.Trader Joe's founder Joe Coulombe, seen around 1985 in Pasadena, Calif., died Friday at the age of 89.The idea, when stated simply, doesn't exactly inspire scream"grocery empire." Yet that's just what became of the maritime-themed specialty market that Joe Coulombe first opened in 1967 in Pasadena, Calif.
"Joe was the perfect person at the right time for Trader Joe's. He was a brilliant thinker with a mesmerizing personality that simply galvanized all with whom he worked," CEO Dan Bane said in a statement included with the announcement. Those early years began with a modest series of convenience stores by the name of Pronto, which the Rexall drugstore chain had tasked Coulombe with operating in Los Angeles in the late 1950s. Within several years, he had purchased Pronto for his own — but soon found his cluster of stores confronted with a push from 7-Eleven, which he described in 2011 as the"800-pound gorilla of convenience stores."He recalled seeing statistics that education levels in the U.S.
Coulombe and the fledgling company went one step further in 1972, launching the Trader Joe's label and slapping quirky names on healthy, relatively low-priced foods such as granola, the company's first private-label product.
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