Quebec’s largest and most respected family footwear retail companies, Yellow is also the oldest in the Province with three generations of the same family at the helm of the Company.
From it's humble origin in the early 1900’s , Samuel and Sarah Avrith started to display and sell salesman samples of footwear in the window of their tiny house on De Bullion Street in Montreal.
1916
THE BEGINNING
Samuel Avrith, together with his wife and children, opened his first store on Mount Royal Street in Montreal.
He named the store after the yellow sample tags affixed to the factory room samples he used to buy from the various factories in Quebec and sell direct to the client.
1946
ERNEST AVRITH
Ernest Avrith, the ninth of 10 children, began working for the family business. With his fluent knowledge of French and natural retail instincts, he soon rose to the level of senior supervisor.
1958
PASSING THE FLAME
Ernest Avrith bought out his father and took over the chain of 17 stores. The stores were well known for selling a range of basic footwear for the entire family with full service. His understanding and dedication to keeping prices low to better serve the consumer during that period, lead to a rapid expansion to 43 stores throughout the Province of Quebec.
1969
SELF SERVICE
After realizing that the traditional merchandising and full service selling model was no longer sustainable to achieve his aim of providing his clients the "best for less", he reorganized his store concept to a self service model, in which the consumers could serve themselves.
JOLIÈTTE
The first self-service store opened in Joliette. The radically new concept for its time turned out to be a huge success with the local clientele. Immediately, Mr. Avrith and his staff promptly set out converting most of the 43 stores to the self-service concept. And by the early 70’s, Yellow became one of the largest and most successful shoe retailers in Quebec.
1981
NEW GENERATION
After completing his Ph.D. at Trinity College, Cambridge University in England, Douglas Avrith, joined his father Ernest at Yellow Shoes, where he passed a 5 year apprenticeship, until he became the Director of Operations for the Company.
1986
THE CHANGE BEGINS
All company operations were transformed to meet the needs of the existing and future clients envisioned by Douglas Avrith and his team at Yellow. All aspects of the company were improved and new purchasing and styling teams were brought in to change the way in which Yellow would meet the challenge of the new Millennium and still achieve the best product offering for its Quebec based client; a “family tradition since 1916”.
1992
YELLOW HAS CHANGED...
With a new slogan «Yellow has Changed… Change for Yellow» the company launched a massive publicity campaign. Along with the new campaign, four new Yellow concept stores opened simultaneously. Modeled as a shopping mall of different boutiques offering a wide range of quality products for the entire family. The new approach was extremely popular and captivated a completely new generation of Quebec families.
2016
À VOS PIEDS SINCE 1916
Yellow celebrates its 100 year of continued operations in Quebec. New statistics and research show that Yellow is one of the most admired enterprise in Quebec and has one of the highest rate of visitation for quality footwear of any store banner in the Province of Quebec; attesting to its continued success in “simply doing what we do best since 1916”.