True Value
American hardware store
The True Value Company is an American wholesaler and hardware store brand. The corporate headquarters are located in Chicago.
Historically, True Value was a cooperative owned by retailers until 2018, when it was purchased by ACON Investments. In October 2024, True Value filed for bankruptcy and competitor Do It Best agreed to purchase the company.
History
Origins
True Value Company traces its history back to four entities: Hibbard Spencer Bartlett & Company (formed in 1855); American Hardware & Supply (formed in 1910); Coast to Coast Corporation (formed in 1928); Cotter & Company (formed in 1948).
Hibbard introduced the True Value name in 1932 for a line of hand tools. In 1940, the company began opening several test stores under the name. In 1953, the True Value program was introduced. By 1957, Hibbard had closed its small accounts and concentrated solely on its True Value program. During this time, the company began buying up smaller wholesalers.
“True Value” enters the record as american hardware store. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what True, Value and American can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 12, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q7847545. 1 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 2 carry qualifiers and 1 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 2018, 2024, 1855 and 1910.
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This entry incorporates text from “True Value” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.