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Everyone gets their start somewhere. And it's no different for major national retailers.
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Plenty of modern-day national big-box and department stores have been around for decades, undergoing the crucial changes necessary to survive in the brutal retail business. Still others maintain glimmers of their old selves, like Walmart's perpetual focus on low prices and the warehouse layout adopted by Home Depot and Costco.
Here's a look at early iterations of major retailers:
Macy's Herald Square flagship store in New York City may have become famous, but the retailer didn't get its start in Manhattan. A dry goods business that would later become Macy's first opened its doors in Haverhill, Massachusetts, in 1851.
The company that would become Best Buy launched in 1966 as a single St. Paul, Minnesota, audio store known as Sound of Music. Sound of Music rebranded into Best Buy in 1983.
The company built its first ever store in Älmhult, Sweden, in 1958. That inaugural store would come to have the playroom and restaurant that Ikea is still known for today.
Home Depot was born in Atlanta, Georgia, on June 22, 1979, when twin 600,000-square-foot locations opened up for the first time on Memorial Drive and Buford Highway.
