Genuine Parts history

In 1936, about $2 was spent on parts for the average one-year-old car, whereas a three-year-old car required $10 in parts.

Genuine continued to grow during World War II. Consumers again held onto their older cars, sometimes having little choice because automakers were devoting much of their capacity to the war effort. As a result, $19 in parts were bought for the average car in 1945.

In the year of its 20th anniversary in 1948, the company had $20 million in sales.

By 1962 the firm owned 97 retail stores and 12 warehouses along the East Coast and in the South and had annual sales of about $80 million.

Expansion outside the United States began in 1972, when Genuine acquired auto parts distributor Corbetts, Ltd., which was based in Calgary, Alberta.

1976: The company expands into industrial parts with the acquisition of Motion Industries.

In 1979 the firm bought a Michigan-based industrial parts distributor, Michigan Bearing Company, to expand that segment of its business.

Genuine's sales reached $1.6 billion in 1981, of which 63 percent came from the distribution of parts, 22 percent came from industrial replacement parts, and 8 percent from office-supply products.

The system, developed with Data General Corp., cost $24,000 to $30,000 per complete system, and grew to include 900 jobbers by 1982.

Sales for the industrial group were $547 million in 1988, with profits of $35.7 million.

Since 1989 Genuine had held a minority stake in UAP, a distributor of auto and industrial parts with annual sales of $555 million.

In 1995 NAPA entered into an agreement with Penske Corporation to become the exclusive parts supplier for more than 850 Penske Auto Centers.

By year-end 1996, there were 5,700 NAPA stores, 750 of which were owned by Genuine Parts.

Also in 1999, Genuine acquired Brittain Brothers, Inc., a NAPA distributor based in Oklahoma City that served more than 190 stores in Oklahoma, Missouri, Arkansas, and Texas.