Forever 21 is a multinational fast fashion retailer headquartered in Los Angeles, California, United States. Originally founded as the store Fashion 21 in Highland Park, Los Angeles in 1984, it is currently operated by Authentic Brands Group and Simon Property Group, with about 540 outlets. The company sells accessories, beauty products, home goods, and clothing for women, men and children, and is considered an epitome of the fast fashion industry due to its fashionable and trendy offerings with very low pricing. The company has been involved in various controversies that include labor practice issues and copyright infringement accusations. History 1984–2017: founding and expansion Originally known as Fashion 21, the store was founded in Los Angeles on April 16, 1984, by Do Won Chang and Jin Sook Chang, married immigrants from South Korea. The original store was located at 5637 N. Figueroa Street in the Highland Park district of Los Angeles. Funded with $11,000 in savings, designs similar to those seen in South Korea were sold to and targeted at the Los Angeles Korean American community. Merchandise was acquired at wholesale closeouts from manufacturers. with sales totaling $US 700,000 in the store's first year of operation. The Changs later changed the name Fashion 21 to Forever 21 and changed the business model to fast fashion, drawing from trending fashion and selling the items for low prices. Sales were high enough in the first decade that the company added new stores on an average of every six months, largely in malls. Forever 21 purchased the chain Gadzooks for $33 million in 2005, then doubled its number of stores to 400, over the next two years; retail analysts estimated sales growth from $640 million in 2005 to $1 billion in 2006. Unlike its competitors, the company also focused on whole families, rather than teenagers exclusively, and at a typical 25,000 square feet, had significantly larger stores. In 2006, the company opened its 40,000 square-foot showcase store in Pasadena, California, offering women's, men's, and children's clothing, as well as accessories and lingerie. Forever 21 was also operating a website and a number of free-standing For Love accessories stores. The company increased its square footage by 30% in 2007. In April 2008, the Chicago Tribune wrote that, while many retailers were scaling back expansion to adjust for the economy, Forever 21 was "going gangbusters" and expanding at a fast rate: over the prior three years