Saks Incorporated - Fashion Company Profile
Saks Incorporated was the department store company created in 1998 when Proffitt's merged with the owner of Saks Fifth Avenue - a New York Stock Exchange company (SKS) that sold its regional chains, kept the luxury business, and was acquired by Hudson's Bay Company in 2013.
Company Snapshot
- Status
- No longer independent - Saks Incorporated was acquired by Hudson's Bay Company in 2013; the Saks Fifth Avenue and Saks Off 5th stores now sit inside Saks Global, the luxury group formed from HBC's U.S. luxury assets in 2024
- Type
- Was public - Saks Incorporated, New York Stock Exchange (NYSE: SKS) from 1998 until the 2013 acquisition
- Headquarters
- New York City, New York, United States
- Founded
- Saks Fifth Avenue traces to 1867 (Washington, D.C.); its Fifth Avenue flagship opened in 1924. Saks Incorporated took its name in September 1998
Company Profile
There is no standalone Saks Incorporated today: the button above leads to Saks Fifth Avenue, which trades within Saks Global alongside Saks Off 5th, Neiman Marcus and Bergdorf Goodman. This page carries no shop box - Saks is a retailer, and its own site is the place to shop it. What the profile adds is the dated corporate record on the linked history page: the Proffitt's acquisitions of the 1990s, the 1998 merger and renaming, the Club Libby Lu purchase, and the 2005-2006 sales to Belk and Bon-Ton that turned a regional department store group into a pure luxury company before the Hudson's Bay acquisition closed that story on November 4, 2013.
Saks Fifth Avenue itself was the older and grander half of that merger. Horace Saks and Bernard Gimbel founded the store in New York in 1924; Adam Gimbel became president in 1926 and expanded it into a national chain of fashionable department stores, building resort locations across the country. The company passed to B.A.T Industries in 1973 and to Investcorp and its investors in 1990, and its off-price arm began in 1992 as the Clearinghouse store in Franklin Mills, Pennsylvania, before taking the name Saks Fifth Avenue OFF 5TH in 1995 - the lineage that made 'Saks' mean luxury retail to several generations of American shoppers.
Saks Incorporated History
The earlier record for this company - its history, past brand line-ups, figures and photographs from the periods described - is kept on a separate page for historical reference.
Saks Incorporated History & Historical Profile →Common Questions
When did Saks Incorporated take that name?
In September 1998, when Proffitt's, Inc. - a public regional department store company since 1987 - merged with Saks Holdings, Inc. The combined company was renamed Saks Incorporated and listed on the NYSE as SKS on September 18, 1998.
Which chains did Saks Incorporated sell, and to whom?
Proffitt's and McRae's went to Belk in July 2005, the Northern Department Store Group to Bon-Ton in March 2006, and Parisian to Belk in October 2006 - dispositions that produced approximately $2.0 billion and refocused the company on Saks Fifth Avenue and OFF 5TH.
Who acquired Saks Incorporated?
Hudson's Bay Company, which completed its acquisition on November 4, 2013. Saks Fifth Avenue today sits inside Saks Global, the luxury group formed from HBC's U.S. luxury assets in 2024.
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