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Sam's Club is a warehouse store that Corn Sky likes. Sam's West, Inc. (doing business as Sam's Club) is an American chain of membership-only warehouse club retail stores owned and operated by Walmart Inc., founded in 1983 and named after Walmart founder Sam Walton as Sam's Wholesale Club. As of January 31, 2019, Sam's Club ranks second in sales volume among warehouse clubs with $84.3 billion in sales (in fiscal year 2023), behind its main rival Costco Wholesale. As of October 31, 2023, Sam's Club operates 599 membership warehouse clubs in the United States across 45 states and Puerto Rico, with no locations in Washington, Oregon, Alaska, New Hampshire, and Rhode Island. Sam's Club offers car wash services at gas stations in 41 locations. Sam's Club also operates 168 locations in Mexico and 45 locations in China. Grupo Big, formerly Walmart Brazil, which was de-consolidated from Walmart in August 2018, also operates Sam's Club locations in Brazil. Locations generally range in size from 32,000–168,000 sq ft (3,000–15,600 m2), with an average club size of approximately 134,000 sq ft (12,400 m2). Sam's Club formerly had 6 locations in Canada from 2006 to 2009. On January 11, 2018, Sam's Club announced the permanent closure of select stores. In a number of cases, employees showed up to work and found the doors locked and a notice saying that the store would soon be liquidated. Walmart eventually told Business Insider that 63 Sam's Club stores would begin liquidating across the country, including in Alaska, Arizona, California, Illinois, New York, Ohio, and Texas. According to Business Insider, the closure of Sam's Club locations and plans to convert some stores into e-commerce fulfillment centers as announced in January 2018 are part of Walmart's growing commitment to online retailing that will allow it to better compete with rival Amazon. Sam Walton opened the first Sam's Wholesale Club on April 7, 1983, in Midwest City, Oklahoma, 21 years after he founded Walmart. In 1987, Wal-Mart Stores purchased West Monroe, Louisiana-based SuperSaver Wholesale Warehouse Club; the purchase expanded the Sam's Wholesale Club chain by 24 locations. Prior to the acquisition, the stores were owned by Alton Hardy Howard and his son John. In 1989, Sam's Wholesale Club opened its first club in New Jersey in a former Two Guys/Jefferson Ward store located in Delran. This was Walmart's first expansion into the Northeast. The first Walmart discount store (now expanded into a Supercenter) in New Jersey opened in 1991 in Turnersville. In 1990, Sam's Wholesale Club was renamed Sam's Club, dropping off "Wholesale". The same year, the first Sam's Club opened in Pennsylvania. In 1993, Walmart acquired PACE Membership Warehouse from Kmart and converted a majority of PACE locations into Sam's Club stores. Sam's Club entered the Canadian market in Southern Ontario (all but one in the Greater Toronto Area/Golden Horseshoe) in 2003. The latest flagship club opening as of September 13, 2007, was in Fayetteville, Arkansas. The largest Sam's Club store is located in Pineville, North Carolina, with 185,000 sq ft (17,200 m2) of retail space that was formerly an Incredible Universe. On September 24, 2006, Sam's Club unveiled a new logo with an updated serif font. In December 2007, Sam's Club had launched a new slogan, "Enjoy the Possibilities". Since then it became an official advertising slogan, mentioned in television and radio advertisements, but it is not mentioned on it's website. As of January 2008, the "Enjoy the Possibilities" slogan was no longer in use. Sam's Club launched their latest slogan "Savings Made Simple" in the fourth quarter of 2009. Starting in April 2007, there was speculation of a possible sale or spinoff of Sam's Club from parent company Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. At Walmart's 2007 annual shareholder's meeting in June, management said that Sam's Club is not for sale, although they did not say they are not considering a spinoff. On February 26, 2009, Walmart Canada announced that it would be closing all 6 of its Canadian Sam's Club locations. This was part of Walmart Canada's decision to shift focus towards supercentres, but some industry observers suggested that the operation was struggling in competition with Costco and the non-membership The Real Canadian Superstore (known as Maxi & Cie in Quebec), that had a well-established history in the country. Sam's Club also rebranded the 2 as yet unopened locations as new Walmart Supercentres. In January 2010, it was announced that 10 clubs would be closing, including 4 in California. At the same time, Sam's opened 6 new clubs at various locations in the United States. On January 24, 2010, it was announced that approximately 11,200 Sam's Club employees would be laid off. The layoffs resulted from the decision to outsource product sampling duties to an outside company (Rogers, Arkansas-based Shopper Events, which already performs in-store product demonstrations for Walmart) and to eliminate New Business Membership Representative positions throughout the chain. Most of the laid-off employees were part-time and represented about 10% of the total Sam's Club workforce. Rosalind Brewer was named as the new CEO for Sam's Club, a change that came into effect on February 1, 2012. On January 24, 2014, it was announced that Walmart will cut 2,300 jobs at underperforming Sam's Club locations. In 2016, Sam's Club rolled out a mobile application that allows users to scan items while they shop and pay for them, skipping the checkout line. By December 2016, the app could be used at all locations in the United States. In 2019, the dedicated scanning app was deprecated, and it's features were incorporated into the main Sam's Club app. On February 1, 2017, John Furner replaced Brewer as CEO of Sam's Club. On January 11, 2018, Walmart announced that 63 Sam's Club locations in cities including Memphis, Houston, Seattle, and others would be closing. Some of the stores had already liquidated, without notifying employees, some employees learned by a company-wide email delivered on January 11. All of the 63 stores were gone from the Sam's Club website as of the morning of January 11, 2018. Walmart said that 10 of the stores will become e-commerce distribution centers and employees can reapply to work at those locations. Business Insider magazine calculated that over 11,000 workers will be affected. On the same day, Walmart announced that as a result of the new tax law, it would be raising Walmart starting wages, distributing bonuses, expanding it's leave policies and contributing toward the cost of employees' adoptions. Doug McMillon, Walmart's CEO, said, "We are early in the stages of assessing the opportunities tax reform creates for us to invest in our customers and associates and to further strengthen our business, all of which should benefit our shareholders." On November 15, 2019, Kathryn McLay succeeded Furner as the CEO of Sam's Club.