Our business model has been built to have tremendous flexibility and adapt with the times. Throughout our 47-year history as a Company, we have maintained an unwavering focus on executing our off-price business model which has generally allowed us to deliver steady sales and earnings growth through many retail and economic environments. Over the course of our history, our strong financial results and cash flow generation have allowed us to simultaneously invest in the growth of the business and return significant value to our shareholders. Our strong sales and profitability performance in Fiscal 2024 underscores our great confidence in the outlook for our business.
Longer term, we believe significant opportunity remains for us to deliver value to more consumers, capture additional market share across the globe, and further increase our profitability. At TJX, our commitment to value has been our mission since day one and we have never wavered. We are convinced that our flexible, off-price model and combination of brand, fashion, price, and quality will continue to be our winning retail formula going forward.
As we pursue our long-term goals for global growth, we see our major strengths as the following:
In our 47-year history as a Company, availability of quality product has never been an issue even as we have grown to over 5,000 stores.2
Over the years, we have built a flexible, value-driven, “global sourcing machine.” We have over 1,300 Associates in our buying organization, operate buying offices around the world, and source product from more than 100 countries. Further, we have a global buying presence and source from a vendor universe of more than 21,000 vendors. Our buyers are typically in the marketplace throughout the year, and with “no walls” between departments in our stores, we can shift merchandise categories to take advantage of market opportunities and adjust to changing consumer preferences. We are able to buy in many different ways and are typically willing to purchase less-than-full assortments of items, styles, and sizes, as well as quantities ranging from small to very large. We’re confident that we can continue to offer consumers an exciting mix of quality products in our stores and online today and in the future.
We plan to continue growing TJX as the leading global, off-price, value retailer of apparel and home fashions for the long term. We operate over 5,000 stores2 across nine countries on three continents and see the potential to expand our store base to 6,275 stores long term with our current chains in our current geographies. Our Company has a focused portfolio of four major divisions, and we believe they all have an opportunity to further grow their store base over the long term.
Our ability to leverage our global teams, infrastructure, and operational expertise are some of the major reasons for our confidence in being able to open additional stores around the world over the long term.
Beyond our successful brick-and-mortar business, we see e-commerce as complementary to our stores and another way to expand our customer base. We have six e-commerce sites that offer consumers differentiated merchandise and great values. In the U.S., we operate tjmaxx.comOpens new window, marshalls.comOpens new window, and sierra.com. In Europe, we operate tkmaxx.comOpens new window in the U.K., tkmaxx.deOpens new window in Germany, and tkmaxx.atOpens new window in Austria.
1Total TJX stores includes 101 Sierra stores in the U.S., as of Q2 FY25. Sierra stores are not included in the estimated store growth potential.
We take a prudent approach to our capital structure to support the business and the long-term success of our Company. Over the course of our history, our strong financial returns and cash generation have allowed us to simultaneously invest in the growth of the business and return significant cash to shareholders. Our “A” S&P Global rating is one of the strongest in retail, and we are committed to maintaining a strong rating. We believe this is an important metric for our vendors, landlords, and other business associates.
In Fiscal 2024, we generated $6.1 billion in operating cash flow driven by record net income, and ended the year with $5.6 billion in cash. We have a very strong balance sheet and continue to generate a tremendous amount of cash flow.
Additionally, we returned $4.0 billion to shareholders through our buyback and dividend programs in Fiscal 2024, which is the most we've returned to shareholders on an annual basis in our history. We are in a great position to continue investing to support the growth of our business while simultaneously returning significant cash to our shareholders.
1Total TJX stores includes 95 Sierra stores in the U.S., as of FY24. Sierra stores are not included in estimated store growth potential.
2As of August 3, 2024, which was the end of the Company's second quarter of Fiscal 2025.
Other references on this page are as of February 3, 2024, which was the end of the Company’s fiscal year.
Updated August 2024 unless otherwise noted.