At the start of the same decade of Watergate, Jimmy Carter and the Three Mile Island meltdown, Pittsburghers were listening to The Doors at the Civic Arena, meeting a brash young quarterback known as Terry Bradshaw. They were also watching the last good years before the imminent collapse of its defining industry.
Once upon a time, US Steel was the pride and joy of the United States. It was also the most valuable company in the whole world.
The 122-year-old company has agreed to be purchased by Japanese firm Nippon Steel in a baffling $14.1 billion deal.
However, this isn’t exactly the first instance of an international company rapidly snapping up a classic American brand.
“All-American” companies such as Jeep and Budweiser also have a renowned international flair, as many other classic US brands. Here’s a list of the most notable ones:
GE appliances
There isn’t any other company embodying quite as good America’s trailblazing spirit as General Electric. The company was initially founded by legendary American inventor Thomas Edison.
However, Americans with a GE microwave or even a washing machine in their homes might not know that General Electric’s century-old appliance division is owned by Haier Group, based in Qingdao, China.
Haier bought the division from General Electric for $5.6 billion in 2016, as General Electric’s business stalled. Their intention was to raise cash, wishing to chip away at the mountain of debt they gathered.
Haier is in itself a huge appliance seller in the United States, with its own products offered at US stores like Home Depot and Lowe’s.
Budweiser
Budweiser’s red and white cans, as well as Bud Light’s blue cans, are easy to recognize too many Americans out there.
Budweiser’s brewer, known as Anheuser-Busch, right after the company’s founders, was made in the United States in 1879.
It helped pioneer pasteurization technology that allowed beers to be shipped across the country without spoiling, as per their website.
However, Budweiser’s parent company was bought by European alcohol conglomerate InBev in 2008, forming a new company: AB InBev, based in Leuven, Belgium.
AB InBev also owns other well-known beer brands such as Corona and Stella Artois.
Burger King
Well, now the current home of the Whopper is Toronto, Canada. Sort of. The seminal fast food chain, which was founded in Miami in 1954, has been part of Canadian conglomerate Restaurant Brands International for almost a decade.
RBI was also formed in 2014 with a $12.5 billion merger between Burger King and Canada-based coffeehouse Tim Hortons.
As RBI’s headquarters is currently in Toronto, Burger King’s functional headquarters are still in Miami. Since RBI’s creation, it has snapped up two other popular food brands: Popeye’s Louisiana Kitchen and Firehouse Subs.
7-Eleven
With its classic Slurpee and Big Gulp beverages, 7-Eleven is by far one of America’s most recognizable convenience store chains.
Over 13,000 7-Eleven stores operate in the United States, making it by far one of the largest convenience store chains in the whole country.
However, believe it or not, there are more 7-Eleven stores in Japan, according to the company, at least. That’s mainly because the corner store, founded back in 1927 in Texas, is currently owned by Seven & I Holdings, a Japanese retailer based in Tokyo.
Seven & I officially became the sole owner of 7-Eleven in 2005. This happened after Ito-Yokado, a unit of Seven & I, first bought a stake in the convenience store in 1991.
Trader Joe’s
California-based Trader Joe’s boasts itself as a “national chain of neighborhood grocery stores.” However, the grocery chain is known for its private-label goods and competitive prices.
It is also owned by the same German family that made Aldi. Aldi was founded by brothers Karl and Theo Albrecht in 1946, and it was cleaved in half in the 1960s.
One half of the Albrecht family owns Aldi Nord, while the other half owns Aldi Sud. Trader Joe’s has been under Aldi Nord’s ownership since 1979, while Aldi-branded grocery stores in the United States are owned by Aldi Sud. This means that the two chains have no business relationship.
Jeep, Chrysler, and Dodge cars
The Jeep Wrangler was first introduced at the 1986 Chicago Auto Show. However, its roots date all the way back to World War II, when the US Army used a much earlier version as a reconnaissance vehicle around battlefields, according to Jeep.
The famed model, with its well-known rugged design and off-road capacities, has had enduring appeal in America. However, Jeep and its siblings Chrysler and Doge belonged to European companies as far as 2014 goes, when Italian company Fiat Group acquired full ownership of Chrysler Group.
Moreover, in 2021, Fiat Chrysler Automotive Group, as it was named back then, merged with French manufacturer PSA Group, creating Stellantis.
The Amsterdam-based auto giant is now the fourth-largest automaker in the world by volume and also a big part of the Detroit “Big Three” automakers in the United States.
Frigidaire
Refrigerator appliance company Frigidaire is “to blame” for a lot of firsts in America. In fact, according to the company, it is the inventor of the first self-contained refrigerator as well as the first-ever home freezer, which was originally called the “ice cream cabinet.”
Frigidaire also joins GE Appliances a brand that was once owned by General Electric. The refrigerator maker was a huge part of the Edison-founded conglomerate from 1919 to 1979.
After a very brief ownership by White Consolidated Industries, Frigidaire was purchased by the Swedish multinational home appliance manufacturer Electrolux AB in 1986. Ever since, it has remained in its ownership.
Ben & Jerry’s
Ben & Jerry’s is mostly known for its quirky ice cream flavors, with pun-filled names such as “Cherry Garcia”, or “Phish Food.”
The ice cream company was founded in 1978 by school friends Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield, in a converted Vermont gas station, and it was bought by British conglomerate Unilever back in 2000.
That basically means that the sweet treat shares a home with consumer goods such as Axe Body Spray and Vaseline.
One company that’s American
Even if many brands with international owners could seek to highlight their American roots, at least one of Ben & Jerry’s competitors decided to take a completely different route. Häagen-Dazs was cooked up by Polish immigrants Reuben and Rose Mattus back in 1960, in the Bronx, New York.
The couple also invented a made-up Danish-sounding name for the brand, which more than likely added an air of mystery to the ice cream makers’ origins ever since.
American companies owned by the Chinese: AMC
The nation’s biggest movie theater chain was bought by the Dalian Wanda Group in 2012 for no less than $2.6 billion.
Chinese businessman Wang Jianlin, who also runs Dalian, has a taste for Hollywood, having also bought a huge film studio.
In November 2016, AMC added Carmike Cinemas to its holdings, for $1.2 billion. Jianlin also tried to purchase a controlling stake in Paramount Pictures last year, but the parent firm Viacom adamantly rejected the offer.
Smithfield Foods
This $7.1 billion-dollar deal, finalized in 2013, remains up to this day the largest purchase of an American firm by a Chinese company.
Virginia-based Smithfield Foods has been quite an icon of the American food industry. It is also best known for its hams (especially the holiday one).
The deal also spurred controversy and concern at the time. Even so, Smithfield has thrived, adding jobs to the market and hitting sales records year after year.
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