Demoulas Brothers
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The Demoulas Brothers were the founders of Market Basket, a grocery market chain in northern New England. It has stores from central New Hampshire to Bristol County, Massachusetts with headquarters in Tewksbury, Massachusetts.
[edit] Early Years
Telemachus ("Mike") Demoula (b. October 10, 1920 - d. May 24, 2003) and George A. Demoulas (b. 1919 - d. June 27, 1971) in Lowell, Massachusetts, were two out of the six children born to Greek immigrants, Athanasios ("Theoni") Demoulas and Efrosine Soulis,[1]originally from a village near the Meteora and Pindus Mountains. The brothers founded the chain in the early 1950s when they bought their parents' mom and pop-style store in Lowell, Massachusetts for $15,000 and converted it into modern a supermarket with lower prices from their competitors.
In 1948 Telemachus ("Mike") A. Demoulas married Irene Psoinos and had four children: Frances (1950), Glorianne (1952), Arthur T. (1955), and Caren (1959). In 1953 George A. Demoulas married Evanthea Koukias and they too had four children: Fotene (born in 1954), Evan (1955), Diana (1956) and Arthur S.(1958). In 1971 George died suddenly of a heart attack while vacationing with his family in Greece, he was only 51 years old at the time. At the time of the merger, the two sides of the Demoulas families owned an equal number of shares in DSM but George's family claims that changed with the death of their father in 1971. Since then both families were in legal disputes over the business.[2].
[edit] Trivia
- Director Arthur S. Demoulas was rated Boston's 8th wealthiest person in March of 2006 with assets of $1.6 billion.[3]
- Ranked number 210 as the World’s Largest Family businesses.[4]
- Demoulas Scholarship: Established by Mike Demoulas in memory of his parents, Theoni and Efstratios Demoulas. Candidates must be of Macedonian descent and families members in good standing of the Greek Orthodox Cathedral of Boston.[5]
- Arthur and Efrasine Demoulas had six children: John, George and a twin sister who died two months after birth, Mike, Ann, and Evangelos.
