Marvin Ellison's route into retail leadership began far from a corporate boardroom. Born in Tennessee in 1966, he grew up in Brownsville as the middle child in a family of seven. While studying business at the University of Memphis, he worked at a convenience store, cleaned offices and drove a truck to cover his expenses. The degree took five and a half years.
He kept studying after entering the workforce, completing an Executive MBA at Emory University's Goizueta Business School in 2005 while working at The Home Depot. In an alumni profile, he described how the program widened his understanding of finance and business strategy. The same account recalls his first retail job: providing security at Target.
He spent fifteen years at Target and twelve in senior operations roles at Home Depot, serving from 2008 to 2014 as Home Depot's executive vice president of U.S. stores, with responsibility for sales, operations, installation services and tool rental.
Ellison became chief executive of JCPenney in 2015, the first Black chief executive in the department-store chain's 112-year history. He took the job as the chain struggled to find its footing, and two years later Lowe's brought him in for a similar assignment, naming the JCPenney chief executive its new president and chief executive in July 2018. The move returned him to the home-improvement business he knew from his twelve years at Home Depot. The Lowe's leadership biography lists him as chairman, president and chief executive officer.
