January 1956
L&R Distributors opens its doors for business. Founded by the Lucas family its mission, to service the NYC market as a “Rack Jobber” of General Merchandise and Hair Appliances. L&R started out modestly by operating out of a small store-front operation and consistently grew by “pounding” the streets of NYC. Its heritage was and remains to service the customer correctly… As Mike Lucas Sr. would always say, “The customer comes first.”
March 1958
L&R moves out of its initial location to larger store-front operation to handle its initial expansion.
March 1964
L&R moves to its first distribution center on Atlantic Avenue and begins running its own trucks for delivery and pack out service.
September 1978
L&R moves its corporate office and warehouse into the current Brooklyn location from Atlantic Avenue in Brooklyn.
January 1982
Mike Lucas Jr. takes on the roll as VP of Sales for the company. Under Mike’s leadership L&R begins to dominate the East Coast market, specifically the NYC Metro area.
February 1984
L&R installs its first IBM system to handle order processing and accounting functions.
August 1990
L&R expands its Brooklyn, NY facility to support its continued growth as an East Coast distributor.
September 1992
L&R strengthens its position as an established East Coast distributor by increasing the size of its sales force in surrounding geographic regions in addition to its stronghold in NYC.
July 1996
L&R contracts to supply a large regional chain. Until now L&R was primarily focused on independent and small chains on the East Coast. This leads to L&R contracting and servicing several regional chains and growing its customer base.
April 2003
Mike Lucas Jr. becomes President of the company, leading L&R’s strong management team in sales, operations and finance. L&R is now has a strong East Coast presence in independent retailers as well as many regional chains.
August 2005
L&R contracts to supply its first national supermarket customer now servicing stores across the Western United States for the first time.
August 2007
L&R Purchases Allied Supply Co., a 60+ year old national non-foods distributor, helping launch L&R’s strong, broad national presence. Mike Lucas takes on the position of CEO and Marc Bodner takes on the position of President of the “New L&R.” Over the decades, Allied Supply Co. grew through the acquisition of smaller distributors, such as Accelerated Sales (NY), Economy Sales (New England), Keystone Merchandise (PA), Lake Services (NJ), Brooklyn Toy (NY), among others.
May 2008
L&R moves its West Coast operation from a 3rd party warehouse into a state of the art distribution facility in Rancho Cucamonga, CA. L&R now operates 3 distribution centers on the East & West coasts.
January 2009
L&R converts its corporate ERP Solution, rolling out WMS, incentive based pay, data mining and many other features to all facilities and departments across the company.
June 2011
L&R purchases the non-foods division of UNFI, further expanding its national reach and growing its product mix to include expanded general merchandise, HBC, cosmetics, ethnic and housewares categories.
March 2013
L&R acquires the assets of SAJ Distributors along with the private label Select Brand from Walgreen Co. The L&R acquisition of SAJ has given L&R the geographic location to continue its growth model across all facets of its business. It has also provided an additional 1,000 points of independent grocery distribution into L&R’s existing client base. This continued as one of L&R’s strategic plans, which is to grow the independent grocery class of trade.
February 2015
Marc becomes CEO/Owner and Reilly Murray moves into the position of president at L&R.
May 2017
L&R outgrows its office space on the east coast and enters agreement to move their main offices to Industry City, while constructing a new state-of-the-art distribution center in Monroe Township, New Jersey – both expected to be ready late 2017.
August 2017
L&R launches new distribution center in Monroe Township, NJ.
November 2018
L&R launches LRFS- LR Fulfillment Services- L&R's own ecommerce solution which delivers white-label, direct-to-consumer fulfillment.
2018
L&R completes its white label ecommerce fulfillment software, giving it’s retailers the ability to utilize L&R’s inventory across the US available to their end consumers via their ecommerce sites or as an add-on widget developed with Locai software solutions. In addition, L&R provides A+ content as well as the direct to consumer fulfillment capability.
2019
L&R onboards Largest Grocery Chain in the United States, Kroger Co.
July 2020
Platinum Equity acquires L&R
October 2021
L&R transitions from its CA distribution center to an all-new, state-of-the-art distribution center in Reno, NV
L&R onboards nationwide wellness provider, Massage EnvyFebruary 2022
L&R IGNITE!
March 2022
L&R begins its partnership with SJ creations
