With its packets, pockets, and boxes, The Container Store has the storage products niche well-contained. Its merchandise ranges from backpacks to recipe holders. The home organization pioneer has nearly 30 stores, mostly in major cities in California, Colorado, Georgia, Illinois, Maryland, New York, and Texas. The stores carry more than 10,000 items; the company's Elfa brand wire shelving accounts for about one-fifth of sales. The company touts a low employee turnover rate, thanks in part to high wages. Chairman Garrett Boone and president and CEO Kip Tindell own the company. They met in 1969 working in a Montgomery Ward paint department and opened their first store in Dallas in 1978.