Lojas Americanas is a Brazilian retail chain founded in 1929 in the city of Niterói, Rio de Janeiro, by the Austrian-Brazilian Max Landesmann and Americans John Lee, Glen Matson, James Marshall and Batson Borger.

The company was founded in 1929 by Americans John Lee, Glen Matson, James Marshall and Batson Borger.

While on their trip to South America, they met Brazilians Aquino Sales and Max Landesman, who convinced them to change their plans and head to Rio de Janeiro.

[3] After spending time in Rio de Janeiro, the Americans saw that there were many public employees and military personnel with stable but modest salaries.

As a result, the Americans decided that Rio de Janeiro was the perfect city in which to launch their new concept store.

The council approved the participation of Lojas Americanas in a deal in 1998 which detailed their actionary control of 23 stores with the French supermarket company Comptoirs Modernes, connected to Grupo Carrefour).

Americanas.com announced in November 2006 its merger with Submarino, creating an absolute leading company in the online sales segment in Brazil.

[citation needed] In January 2007, Lojas Americanas announced their acquisition of BWU, the corporation responsible for Blockbuster in Brazil, and integrated them into over 127 stores.

[7] Most recently, in 2013, the Lojas Americanas network was forced to pay R$250 thousand in reparations to Bolivian sweatshop workers making clothing for the company's BASIC+ brand.