Browns Shoes
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|
| Private | |
| Industry | Retail Manufacturing Shoes |
| Founded | 1940 in Montreal, Quebec, Canada |
| Founder | Benjamin Brownstein |
| Headquarters | Saint-Laurent, Quebec, Canada |
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Number of locations
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57 |
|
Number of employees
|
500-1000 |
| Website | www |
Browns Shoes is a Montreal-based fashion footwear retailer that owns and operates 57 stores across Canada under a variety of footwear brands.
Browns Shoes is a fashion retailer that operates over 50 stores across Canada under the Browns, B2 and Browns OUTLET banners. The company was founded in Montreal in 1940 by Benjamin Brownstein. Today, a third generation leads the business which employs close to 1000 employees nationwide. Browns’ shoes have been seen on prominent Canadian celebrities and personalities such as model Coco Rocha, Montreal Canadien Mike Cammalleri, as well as Ben Mulroney and Tanya Kim from E-TALK Canada, for which Browns is the official footwear supplier. The latest Fall / Winter 2013 Campaign featured Canadian model Coco Rocha, Czech model Petra Nemcova, and Brazilian model Marlon Teixeira.
Browns Shoes was founded in Montreal in 1940 by Benjamin Brownstein, who immigrated to Montreal at the age of 15 from Romania. The original Browns Shoes location, located on St. Catherine Street in downtown Montreal, burned down in 1954. After the fire, Benjamin’s son, Morton Brownstein, took over the family business. Morton Brownstein was born on January 12, 1928 to Benjamin and Minnie Brownstein. Upon graduating from high school, Morton worked at his father’s department store on Montreal’s St. Lawrence Boulevard. Morton married Bernice Greenfield, whom he met at the age of 13 at the Strathcona Academy in Outremont. Together, they had three children –Michael, Janis and Cheryl. After taking over the family business in 1954, Morton decided to take Browns into a different direction toward exclusive designer and fashion footwear. In 1959, he became the first North American retailer to bring Italian-made shoes to Canada. Today, Browns Shoes is a nationwide shoe retailer, with 57 stores across Canada. Morton Brownstein remained the company’s president until 1999, when he ceded the presidency of the company to his son, Michael. On May 23, 2013, Morton Brownstein died at the age of 86 in his Westmount home in Montreal.
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Wikipedia