JC Whitney
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
J.C. Whitney is the largest direct marketer of auto parts and accessories. The company began life in 1915 as The Warshawsky Company, a scrap metal yard on the south side of Chicago. The company's founder was a Lithuanian immigrant named Israel Warshawsky. Throughout World War I, Israel bought failed auto manufacturers and added new parts to his inventory. The Warshawky Company continued to grow, even during the Great Depression.
In 1934, Israel's son Roy joined his father at the company after graduating from the University of Chicago. Roy proposed expanding out from the Chicago-area with a nationwide catalog and placed an ad in Popular Mechanics for sixty dollars. The ad offered readers a "giant auto parts catalog" if they sent in twenty-five cents and response to the ad was huge.
Roy took charge after his father's death in 1943. He continued to grow the business through World War II, always developing new strategies in response to changing customer needs.
Roy retired in 1991.
In 2002, The Riverside Company acquired JC Whitney.
[edit] Trivia
This was one of the few, if any, companies that sold the "Dixie" horn made famous by The Dukes of Hazzard. They had been selling the horn for years before the show aired, and the popularity of the horn during and after the show's run helped increase its sales.
