that is written like an advertisement . please help improve it by removing promotional content and inappropriate external links and by adding encyclopedic content written from a neutral point of view . january 2015 learn how and when to remove this template message ashley furniture industries inc. type private industry furnishings founded 1945 ; 71 years ago 1945 chicago illinois u.s. headquarters arcadia wisconsin u.s. key people ronald g. wanek todd r. wanek products upholstered furniture and casegoods revenue us 3.85 billion number of employees 22 582 website www.ashleyfurniture.com ashley furniture industries inc. is the largest united states home furnishings maker and retailer 1 headquartered in arcadia wisconsin . the company is owned by father and son team ron and todd wanek . ashley furniture manufactures and distributes home furniture products throughout the world . 2 ashley furniture industries sells home furnishings and accessories available through two distribution channels independent furniture dealers and more than 500 ashley furniture homestore retail furniture stores which are independently owned and operated by licensees in the united states canada mexico central america and japan . it has manufacturing and distribution facilities in wisconsin mississippi california pennsylvania north carolina florida china and vietnam . contents 1 history 2 retail presence 3 memorial park 4 references history edit carlyle weinberger founded ashley furniture in chicago in 1945 as a sales operation . specializing in wooden occasional furniture ashley marketed goods made by local companies . later the company opened a branch in goshen indiana . in 1970 ashley invested in the wisconsin based arcadia furniture founded by ronald g. wanek who had begun his career in a furniture factory owned by eugene vogel . when wanek moved to arcadia to open his own factory he took with him eugene vogel s son chuck . the two began doing production work for ashley furniture . even though arcadia started out as a small production plant for ashley s lines in 1976 wanek and group of investors bought out weinberger taking control of ashley furniture . at first the two companies maintained their separate identities with arcadia focusing on production and ashley on sales . by 1982 the merged company s annual sales reached 12 million and it had moved its corporate headquarters from chicago to arcadia . by the mid 1980s ashley offered a line of roughly 350 different furniture products and had turned its design and manufacturing away from heirloom pieces toward products aimed at middle income buyers . the company s growing network included wholesalers such as levitz furniture and mass retailers such as sears kmart and montgomery ward in addition to smaller retailers . sales had climbed to more than 44 million by 1985 . in 1994 ashley acquired upholstery manufacturer sklar peppler and by the late 1990s the company was operating assembly and distribution plants in seattle washington ; pomona california ; new brunswick new jersey ; and orlando florida . gambling that motion furniture was a strong growth area ashley acquired gentry furniture of ripley mississippi in 1999 . that same year the company also branched out into retailing licensing ashley furniture homestores to independent dealers . the chain grew in its first year to approximately 40 stores . 3 by 2000 ashley furniture industries employed more people in arcadia than the town s population . the plant in arcadia had grown from 35 000 square feet 3 300 m2 in 1970 to 1 500 000 square feet 140 000 m2 . the us occupational safety and health administration imposed 1.7 million in fines on ashley due to unsafe working conditions at its arcadia plant which caused over one thousand injuries to workers . 4 today the company maintains plants across the united states and also operates several factories including its largest in pacific rim countries such as china . 5 ron wanek is currently chairman of the board and todd wanek is currently president and ceo . 6 retail presence edit ashley furniture homestores chain of furniture stores is composed of corporate owned stores and independently owned stores with licenses to sell ashley furniture products exclusively including mattresses and accessories . as of september 2016 there are over 600 ashley furniture homestore retail furniture stores operating worldwide . ashley furniture homestore is the largest retail brand of home furniture and accessories . ashley furniture homestore ceo is mark dufresne . citation needed memorial park edit ron wanek designed and built memorial park in arcadia wisconsin with donations from ashley furniture . the park is dedicated to the soldiers who have served in wars throughout the history of the united states . the walkway in the park serves as a time line beginning at the founding of the united states and proceeding into the future . a monument is located for each war at its place in time . references edit craver richard june 3 2015 . firms have sights on ashley furniture . winston salem journal . retrieved june 26 2015 . ashley furniture industries . forbes . october 2014 . http www.answers.com topic ashley furniture industries inc abrams rachel 2015 02 02 . osha cites ashley furniture over dozens of safety violations . the new york times . issn 0362 4331 . retrieved 2016 03 09 . http investing.businessweek.com research stocks private snapshot.asp privcapid 7940469 http biz.yahoo.com ic 55 55652.html retrieved from https en.wikipedia.org w index.php title ashley furniture industries & oldid 742769550 categories companies based in wisconsinmanufacturing companies based in wisconsincompanies established in 1945furniture companies of the united statesfurniture manufacturersprivately held companies based in wisconsinhidden categories articles with a promotional tone from january 2015all articles with a promotional tonepages using infobox company with unsupported parametersall articles with unsourced statementsarticles with unsourced statements from january 2015 navigation menu personal tools not logged intalkcontributionscreate accountlog in namespaces article talk variants views read edit view history more search navigation main pagecontentsfeatured contentcurrent eventsrandom articledonate to wikipediawikipedia store interaction helpabout wikipediacommunity portalrecent changescontact page tools what links hererelated changesupload filespecial pagespermanent linkpage informationwikidata itemcite this page print export create a bookdownload as pdfprintable version languages add links this page was last modified on 5 october 2016 at 17 51 . text is available under the creative commons attribution sharealike license ; 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