It's that time.

Time.

Lock and load.

The Michael Berry Show is on the air.

Today's Michael Berry Show is sponsored by...

Wolco.

Wolco was an American based discount retail chain that was founded in 1962 in Columbus, Ohio

by the F.W. Woolworth Company.

It was a full-line discount department store, unlike the five-and-dine Woolworth

stores which operated at the same time.

The creation of Wolco coincided with the expansion of suburbia across America.

Woolworth's flagship stores were still doing pretty well, but the company wanted to tap

into the growing discount department store market without deluding its dominant position

in the variety store business.

In 1966, there were 18 locations in the United States, and the company experimented

with both Wolco and a more down-scale merchandising unit called WorthMart in the mid-1960s.

Wolco was the eventual winner with customers, and the WorthMart stores were folded into

Wolco's by the 1970s.

Plans were for 30 stores to be added per year.

This led to tremendous growth as over 300 Wolco's stores opened up across North America

by the mid-1970s.

Most Wolco stores sat at around 100,000 square feet, which really was quite large

...