In 1945, businessman Sam Walton opened a store selling products at low prices to get higher-volume sales at a lower profit margin. He portrayed his business mission as being a crusade for the consumer to help get them the lowest prices.

However, due to unusually high lease prices, he experienced a setback. Not one to be bogged down by a single failure, Walton eventually opened a new store and called it Walton’s Five and Dime. The first Walmart Discount City Store was opened in 1962 and within 5 years expanded to 24 stores and reached $12.6 million in sales. Today, Walmart is the world’s largest company by revenue and the largest private employer in the world with 2.2 million employees.