Billionaire Bernie Marcus, a GOP megadonor and cofounder of The Home Depot, has died, the company announced Tuesday. He was 95.
Marcus was “a master merchant and a genius with customer service” who was “unparalleled in generosity and goodwill,” The Home Depot said in a statement honoring their late co-founder. “He loved our customers. He also loved the associates who made the company what it is today.
“More than anything, he deeply believed in the company’s core values, particularly that of giving back,” the statement continued. “He never lost sight of his humble roots, using his success not for fame or fortune but to generously help others.”
A cause of death was not provided.
The son of Russian Jewish immigrants, Marcus was born in 1929 and grew up with his three siblings in a tenement in Newark, New Jersey, according to a bio provided by The Home Depot.
While he dreamed of becoming a doctor, his family was not able to afford medical school, so Marcus enrolled in pharmacy school instead. He also received a degree from Rutgers in merchandising and marketing.
After graduation, Marcus worked within the retail industry for several different chains, eventually crossing paths with Arthur Blank during a stint at Handy Dan Home Improvement in California. In 1978, they both were fired by new management, so they decided to team up and create their own chain.
“The following year, the first Home Depot stores opened in Atlanta, beginning a remarkable journey,” the company statement said. “From those first stores in 1979, Bernie and his fellow founders grew a business that created jobs worldwide — eventually employing more than 500,000 associates.”
Since then, more than 2,000 stores have opened nationwide. The chain boasts a stock market valuation of nearly $400 billion.
Marcus served as The Home Depot’s CEO until 1997 and as the company’s chairman until his retirement in 2002. He had a net worth of about $7.4 billion, according to Bloomberg’s Billionaire Index.
A great deal of his fortune went toward supporting Republican politicians, including the late John McCain, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and former President Donald Trump
In 2020, Marcus and his wife Billi Wilma Marcus were the seventh-largest individual Republican donors in the 2020 election cycle, donating nearly $25 million to Republican campaigns, according to OpenSecrets, a nonprofit group that tracks money in politics.
He has also donated to many charities and Jewish and medical organizations, in addition to providing a $250 million grant that helped opened the Georgia Aquarium back in 2005.
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