stores changed to self-service in the 1920s and 1930s. At its peak in 1932 (see Clarence Saunders), the company operated 2,660 stores and posted annual sales in excess of $180 million. In November 1922, Saunders attempted a squeeze on the substantial short interest in the stock, running the share price up from 40 to 120 and profiting by millions on paper. The Stock Exchange Governors responded by deciding that a corner had been established in Piggly Wiggly and removed the stock from the Board, eventually forcing Saunders to turn over his assets to the banks that had financed his leveraged position. Saunders reputedly lost $9 million in the attempted corner. Following these events, the company was divided into strategic units and sold to regional grocery chains, including Kroger, Safeway, National Tea, and Colonial. In 1935, all 179 Canadian Piggly Wiggly were also sold to Canada Safeway, which merged with Sobeys in 2013. After losing control of Piggly Wiggly, Saunders had no further association with the company. However, he remained interested in automated shopping, with which he experimented initially with the Keedoozle store until he died in 1953. According to John Brooks, Piggly Wiggly's "greatly changed corporate structure...flourished into the 1960s," and hundreds of stores "operated under a franchise agreement with the Piggly Wiggly Corporation, of Jacksonville, Florida. Name According to the Piggly Wiggly web site, Saunders was "reluctant" to explain the origin of the company's name. There are two theories: One story says that, while riding a train, he looked out his window and saw several little pigs struggling to get under a fence, which prompted him to think of the rhyme. Someone once asked him why he had chosen such an unusual name for his organization, to which he replied, "So people will ask that very question." Present company Piggly Wiggly was acquired by the wholesale grocer Malone & Hyde in 1982. Malone & Hyde was acquired by Fleming Companies in 1988. Fleming filed for bankruptcy in 2003, and C&S Wholesale Grocers acquired most of the business, including Piggly Wiggly. C&S acquired regional warehouses Piggly Wiggly Carolina in 2013 and Piggly Wiggly Midwest in 2021. There are more than 600 independently owned and operated stores in 17 states. The company headquarters is located in Keene, New Hampshire. Some of the stores in Alabama have formed Piggly Wiggly Alabama Distributing Company, a retailers' cooperative to manage distribution while using the