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Levi Strauss & Co. is an American clothing company known worldwide for its Levi’s brand of denim jeans.

Modern jeans began to appear in the 1920s, but sales were largely confined to the working people of the western United States, such as cowboys, lumberjacks, and railroad workers. Levi’s jeans apparently were first introduced to the East during the dude ranch craze of the 1930s.

Between the 1950s and 1980s, Levi’s jeans became popular among a wide range of youth subcultures, including greasers, mods, rockers, and hippies. Levi’s popular shrink-to-fit 501s were sold in a unique sizing arrangement; the indicated size referred to the size of the jeans prior to shrinking, and the shrinkage was substantial. The company still produces these unshrunk, uniquely sized jeans. Although popular lore (abetted by company marketing) holds that the original design remains unaltered, this is not the case: the crotch rivet and waist cinch were removed during World War II to conform to War Production Board requirements to conserve metal and were not replaced after the war. Additionally, the back pocket rivets, which had been covered in denim since 1937, were eradicated in the 1950s due to complaints they scratched furniture.

In 2002, Levi Strauss began a close business collaboration with Walmart, producing a special line of “Signature” jeans and other clothes for exclusive sale in Walmart stores until 2006. Levi Strauss leads the apparel industry in trademark infringement cases, filing nearly 100 lawsuits against competitors over a six-year period from 2001. Most cases center on the alleged imitation of Levi’s back pocket double arc stitching pattern (U.S. trademark #1,139,254), which Levi’s filed for a trademark in 1978. Levi’s has successfully sued Guess, Polo Ralph Lauren, Esprit Holdings, Zegna, Zumiez, and Lucky Brand Jeans, among other companies.

In 2002, the company closed its Valencia Street plant in San Francisco, which had opened the same year of the city’s April 1906 earthquake. By the end of 2003, the closure of Levi’s last US factory in San Antonio ended 150 years of jeans made in the United States. Production of a few higher-end, more expensive styles of jeans resumed in the US several years later. By 2007, Levi Strauss was again profitable after declining sales in nine of the previous ten years. Its total annual sales, of just over $4 billion, were $3 billion less than during its peak performance in the mid-1990s. In March 2019, Levi’s debuted on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker “LEVI”.Levi Strauss was valued at $6.6 billion as its IPO was priced above the target.

In 2020, Levi Strauss & Co. are expected to have completely replaced chemical usage with lasers in order to cut and design ripped parts of jeans. In December 2019, the Engage for Good (formerly Cause Marketing Forum) organization awarded the company the Golden Halo Award for 2020 for their advancements in corporate social impact.