 Winmark Corporation's logo | |
| Formerly |
|
|---|---|
| Company type | Public |
| Nasdaq: WINA Russell 2000 Component | |
| Founded | 1988 |
| Founders | Ron Olson and Jeffrey Dahlberg |
| Headquarters | Minneapolis, Minnesota |
Key people | Brett Heffes (CEO) |
| Divisions |
|
| Subsidiaries | Wirth Business Credit |
| Website | winmarkcorporation |
Winmark Corporation is an American franchisor of five retail businesses that specialize in buying and selling used goods. The company is based in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Winmark was founded in 1988 as Play It Again Sports Franchise Corporation by Ron Olson and Jeffrey Dahlberg after they purchased the Play It Again Sports franchise rights from Martha Morris. They renamed the company to Grow Biz International Inc. in June 1993. Grow Biz went public in August 1993. In 2000, John Morgan replaced Dahlberg as CEO and renamed the company to Winmark in 2001. Morgan rescued Winmark from the verge of bankruptcy by selling financially failing franchise concepts and stores and replacing the management team. The company's strategy was to move from owning stores itself to having franchisees own all the stores.
Winmark Corporation owns five franchise-based retail companies that focus on used goods: Music Go Round (musical instruments), Once Upon a Child (children's clothes and toys), Plato's Closet (adolescent and young adult clothes), Play It Again Sports (sports equipment), and Style Encore (women's clothing). Winmark also owned but subsequently sold four franchise-based retailed companies: Computer Renaissance (computer equipment), Disc Go Round (CDs), It's About Game (computer games and video games), and ReTool (tools). Its subsidiary Wirth Business Credit is a small-business supplies leasing company.
Around 2013, research company IBISWorld reported that in the used goods outlet market, Goodwill Industries was first with a 21.5% share, Winmark was second with nearly 6%, and The Salvation Army was third with nearly 4%. In 2016, Winmark had a $1 billion market share in the $17 billion resell industry through its 1,170 franchisees.