Sam's West, Inc. (doing business as Sam's Club) is an American chain of membership-only retail warehouse clubs owned and operated by Walmart Inc., founded in 1983 and named after Walmart founder Sam Walton. As of 2012, Sam's Club chain serves 47 million U.S. (including Puerto Rico) members and is the 8th largest U.S. retailer. As of January 31, 2016, Sam's Club ranks second in sales volume among warehouse clubs with $56.828 billion in sales (in fiscal year 2016) behind rival Costco Wholesale.
Sam's Club had sales of $57.157 billion in FY 2014. It reported a 0.3% sales increase in 2014, 4.1% in 2013, and 8.4% sales increase in 2012. This is significantly higher growth than Walmart U.S. stores, which have not had higher than 2% growth since 2010.Its major competitors are Costco Wholesale and BJ's Wholesale Club.
As of October 31, 2018, Sam's Club operates 597 membership warehouse clubs in 44 U.S. states. Alaska, Massachusetts, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Washington are the only states where Sam's Club does not operate, as is the case for the District of Columbia. Walmart International also operates Sam's Club stores in Mexico and China. It has 163 locations in Mexico, and 22 in China.. Walmart Brazil, which was de-consolidated from Walmart in August 2018, also operates Sam's Clubs in Brazil. Locations generally range in size from 94,000–161,000 sq ft (8,700–15,000 m2), with an average club size of approximately 134,000 sq ft (12,400 m2).There were also Sam's Club locations in Canada, six located in Ontario, in which the last location closed in 2009.On January 11, 2018, Sam’s Club announced the permanent closure of select stores. In a number of cases, employees showed up to work and found the doors locked and a notice saying that the store would be soon liquidated. Walmart eventually told Business Insider that 63 Sam’s Club stores would begin liquidating across the country, including in Arizona, California, Illinois, New York, Ohio and Texas.According to Business Insider, the Sam's Club closings and plans to convert some stores into e-commerce fulfillment centers as announced in January 2018 are part of Walmart's growing commitment to online retailing that will allow it to better compete with its rival Amazon.