Williams Sonoma (WSM) is an high-end retailer that offers kitchen and home appliances, furniture and accessories. And while the stock has been on a tear lately, many investors don’t know that Williams Sonoma has been a public company for over 40 years.
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The original IPO was launched in 1983, and over the years the stock has split several times. If you invested in Williams Sonoma on the IPO date, you would be a very wealthy person today.
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Williams Sonoma Stock Price History
Williams Sonoma launched as a high-end store for the discerning cook and grew quickly after being purchased by Howard Lester in 1976. The company had an initial public offering (IPO) of 1 million shares for over-the-counter investing (OTC) on July 8, 1983.
The IPO launched at $23 per share — around $0.38 split-adjusted price. The stock had a rocky start and eventually dropped about 50% during the first half of the 1980s due to inflation scares and high interest rates.
In September 1986, Williams-Sonoma, Inc. acquired Pottery Barn from Gap and expanded its operations and distribution centers. The company continued to open new stores, averaging around 12 new stores per year.
From the acquisition of Pottery Barn in 1986 until 1990, the stock price soared to nearly five times the IPO listing price. But a downturn became imminent during the early 1990s recession, and it took until November 1993 to reach new all-time highs.
The growth of the company and acquisition of companies within the Williams Sonoma brand started to pay off. While the stock remained volatile in the 1990s, the stock price rose nearly 10 times from 1993 to the height of the Dot Com Bubble in 2000.
Of course, the stock crashed — along with the rest of the market — but rose to new heights within a few years. The split-adjusted price of the stock just before the Great Recession started in 2007 was around $22 per share, or nearly a 5,400% return since IPO!
Fast forward the next 25 years, and Williams Sonoma stock has done very well. The current stock price is now around $150 per share — or around a 39,400% return since IPO!
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What Would a $1K Investment Be Worth Today?
Williams Sonoma stock is not for the faint of heart. Several times over it’s 42-year life, the stock has plummeted nearly 90% — only to recover and grow several years later.
But investors that believed in the company and purchased $1,000 worth of Williams Sonoma stock at its IPO in 1983 would have been handsomely rewarded for not selling.
With several stock splits over the decades, an initial IPO stock price of $23 per share is the equivalent to around $0.38 per share in today’s market. This means that while $1,000 would have bought around 43 shares of Williams Sonoma stock back in 1983, due to eight different stock splits, you’d be holding around 2,612.25 shares of Williams Sonoma stock today.
Those shares — at the current Williams Sonoma stock price of around $150 — would be now worth around $391,837.50!
This is a huge return on your money and far outpaces the S&P 500. In fact, putting $1,000 in the S&P 500 back in 1983 until today would have yielded around $97,000. Holding WSM stock for those 40 plus years would have netted you nearly $300,000 more!
Should You Buy Williams Sonoma Stock?
Williams Sonoma stock is currently down around 30% from its all-time highs in January 2025. But the retailer continues to post great profits, has a portfolio of strong brands and has a more reasonable price-to-earnings ratio than most of the market — around 16.
While the stock could struggle in the short-term due to market volatility — and the unknown long-term consequences of tariffs — Williams Sonoma stock has been through poor markets before and bounced back.
Williams Sonoma stock could be a good investment — but could also drop heavily if tariffs take a huge bite out of profit margins. Time will tell, but it’s hard to deny that Williams Sonoma stock has done well over the past few decades.
As always, past performance does not indicate future results, and any stock price predictions are not a recommendation to buy or sell any securities. It’s a good idea to speak with a licensed financial advisor before making any investment decisions.
Editor’s note: Stock pricing information was sourced from TradingView and is accurate as of April 2025.
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This article originally appeared on GOBankingRates.com: If You’d Invested $1K at Williams Sonoma’s IPO, Here’s How Much Richer You Would Be Today
