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Chief auto parts commercial
Chief Auto Parts was a United States-based auto parts store chain that had stores located in the states of Tennessee, Texas, Nevada, Arizona, Arkansas and California. Chief was founded in 1955 in Norwalk, California by Vern Johnson and Lorin Tuthill. The chain grew to 119 stores, mostly in California, by the time it was purchased by Southland in 1979. It was purchased by Southland Corporation in 1979, along with Citgo and Movie Quik. The company was based in Dallas, Texas and operated as a division of Southland Corporation until 1990. The company expanded in 1985 by acquiring locations in Tennessee, Kentucky, and Alabama by purchasing Honey's Auto Parts in Nashville. At the same time, Chief also acquired 77 Checker Auto Parts locations in Oklahoma and Texas from Lucky Stores when Lucky decided to withdraw Checker from those areas.
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The division was then sold to General Electric. Chief merged with Memphis, Tennessee based AutoZone in 1998. From 1992 until its merger with AutoZone, the company's CEO was David H. Eisenberg.
Corporate Office was located at 5400 Lyndon B Johnson Freeway, Suite 200, Dallas, Texas 75240 at the time of the sale. Texas Regional Warehouse was located at 1515 Wade Drive, Seagoville, TX, 75159.
Former stores
The former Chief stores were converted into AutoZone stores or closed. Chief was considered another convenience concept of 7-Eleven; many of the stores were open 24 hours a day. Many Chief stores were adjacent to 7-Eleven stores, or were in stand-alone buildings. 7-Eleven called them "convenience auto parts stores."
Popular culture
In the show MXC, Chief Otto Parts is the name of a character portraying a Native American.