![]() The stores would be more than half clothing, jewelry, and shoes, calling back to their connection to the May Dept Store Company, owner of Foleys. The company also indicated that they had no plans to change their merchandising plans for the Midwest. Their Chairman stated that Houston wasn’t over-stored, and in fact, had fewer square feet of discount store per resident than any other city they did business in. A few months later in their next press release, Venture would address this exact issue. While the knock-off comment hurt, the over-stored issue was real, and in fact how Venture was able to lease three of their former locations, from another discounter who fared a similar fate. Venture also brought with it a bit of a reputation as a seller of knock-offs rather than real brands. An outside firm noted that while the company would net new jobs, Houston was “over-stored” in terms of discounters and that their opening would eventually result in others closing. One of the first published opinions on Venture was that it wouldn’t do well in Houston. The chain was also in talks for three other sites, including the West Oaks location. Venture purchased a lot at FM 1960 and TX 249, across from Willowbrook Mall, and made an agreement to lease three former Woolco stores (Almeda, Pasadena, and Texas City). The new locations were to be “prototypical” Venture locations, coming in around 96,000 Square Feet on Average, and carrying a merchandise mix similar to Target. The chain also planned to open a distribution center in Texas to support these new stores. The goal in Texas was 50 stores, over the next five years, including locations in Austin and San Antonio. The movement was not completely unexpected as Venture’s push towards the Southwest had already placed stores in Kansas, and most recently in Oklahoma. On March 27, 1992, Venture announced a huge new plan, they would expand into Texas giving concrete plans for a total of 10 stores split between Houston and DFW. The idea behind this was that Venture would be able to focus more resources, and money directly on its stores instead of having to play second banana to its upscale brothers and sisters. In 1990 Venture was spun off as an independent company from May. With the 1988 acquisition of Foley’s by the May Company, executives had their sights set on Texas for the next expansion of Venture. This careful growth into under-served markets helped to bolster the chain’s success. They also began to expand into medium-sized markets in the Midwest, such as Oklahoma, Indiana, and Kansas. ![]() By 1985 Venture had made it to over 50 stores mostly split between Chicago and St. ![]() Decisions for new locations were based on markets where May had experienced success with their full-line department stores. May slowly built up the Venture chain building many new locations and converting a few individually purchased competitors’ stores. The earliest stores even had their department layouts directly lifted from Target. These early stores stylistically resembled Target, using large amounts of red and orange coloring throughout the building, and similar block lettering for the logo, next to a geometric accent. Louis in 1970 and was quickly followed by a few stores throughout the suburban area, along with a few around Chicago. In the late 60s, the company hired a few ex-employees of competing Dayton-Hudson, including Target co-founder John Geisse, with plans to develop a competing upscale discount department store. originally started out as a project of the May Department Store Company, a large conglomerate that bought and owned various department store chains throughout the US.
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