Levi Strauss began business at 90 Sacramento Street in San Francisco. Jacob Davis, a Latvian Jewish immigrant, was a tailor from Reno, Nevada, who often purchased bolts of cloth made from denim from the wholesale house of Levi Strauss & Co.. Contrary to an advertising campaign that suggested that Levi Strauss sold his first jeans to gold miners during the California gold rush, the production of denim overalls only began in 1870. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay From the early 1960s through the mid-1970s, Levi Strauss experienced significant growth in its business with the introduction of the more casual look of the 1960s and 1970s into the “Blue jeans craze” and served as a catalyst for the brand. Levi Strauss attempted to sell the Dockers division in 2004 to relieve some of the company's $2.6 billion in outstanding debt. In 1991, Levi Strauss was implicated in a scandal involving pants made in the Northern Mariana Islands: it was shown that approximately 3% of Levi's jeans sold each year under the Made in the USA label were made by Chinese workers under which The Department of the United States Labor Office called the conditions “slave-like”. The activist group Fuerza Unida formed following the January 1990 closure of a plant in San Antonio, Texas, where 1,150 seamstresses, some of whom had worked for decades for Levi Strauss, saw their jobs exported to Costa Rica. During the mid-to-late 1990s, Furze Unhide picketed Levi Strauss headquarters in San Francisco and staged hunger strikes and sit-ins to protest the company's labor policies. Levi Strauss shares are not publicly traded; the company as of 2016[update] is owned almost entirely by indirect descendants and collateral relatives of Levi Strauss, whose four nephews inherited the San Francisco textile company after their uncle's death in 1902. The company's bonds are listed publicly, as well as shares of the company's Japanese affiliate, Levi Strauss Japan KK In June 1996, the company offered to pay its employees an unusual dividend of up to $750 million over six years, having discontinued an employee stock ownership plan employees at the time of internal family acquisition. Remember: this is just an example. Get a custom paper from our expert writers now. Get a Custom Essay In 2002, Levi Strauss began a close business collaboration with Walmart, producing a special line of "Signature" jeans and other clothing for exclusive sale in Walmart stores until 2006. On May 8, 2013, the San Francisco 49ers of the NFL announced that Levi Strauss & Co. had purchased the naming rights to their new stadium in Santa Clara, California. As of 2016[update], Levi Strauss Signature jeans are sold in 110 countries. After two years of collaboration, the result was a denim jacket that cost $350. Levi's has been worn by people from all walks of life, from miners to Nobel Prize winners, including Albert Einstein himself, whose famous leather jacket was made by Levi Strauss & Co in the 1930s and was recently sold to the house Christies auction for £110,500. Levi Strauss & Co. is a global company organized into three geographic divisions: Levi Strauss Americas, headquartered in San Francisco; Levi Strauss Europe, based in Brussels; and Levi Strauss Asia Pacific, Middle East and Africa, based in Singapore.