Bed Bath & Beyond, Inc. NASDAQ: BBBY was formed in 1971 as a chain of stores across the United States.

They feature medium to high quality domestic merchandise: items for the bedroom, bathroom, kitchen, and dining room. The company also owns the Christmas Tree Shops and Harmon brand names. In total, Bed Bath & Beyond operates 819 stores across 46 states (they are not in Hawaii, Alaska, South Dakota or Wyoming). Sales totalled just under US$6 billion for the fiscal year ended February 25, 2006. Its main competitor in the United States is Linens 'n Things, which runs about 500 stores with a very similar merchandise lineup. Other competitors include Williams-Sonoma, Cost Plus, Pier One Imports and department stores. The typical store is 20,000-50,000 square feet, although stores have been known to go up to 80,000 square feet. This is roughly half the size of your average Wal-Mart SuperCentre.

The Bed Bath & Beyond stock is traded on the NASDAQ and is included in the S&P 500 index and the NASDAQ-100 index.

The company's corporate headquarters are located at 650 Liberty Avenue, Union, New Jersey 07083.

Miscellany

Many jokes have been made about the Beyond portion of the Bed Bath & Beyond name, including on the Fox animated sitcom Family Guy. The jokes usually revolve around working in or browsing on the Beyond portion of the store.

Bed Bath & Beyond is also mentioned in the satirical song "America, Fuck Yeah" from the 2004 film Team America: World Police as one of the better things about the United States.

Additionally, Bed Bath & Beyond is mentioned in comedian Jim Norton's live CD performace, Yellow Discipline. He says that, as a man, if you spend $1000 there, you get a letter congratulating you on being homosexual.

In the film Old School, Will Farrell’s character, Frank, a married man among college students, talks about his Saturday by saying “Well, um, actually a pretty nice little Saturday, we're going to go to Home Depot. Yeah, buy some wallpaper; maybe get some flooring, stuff like that. Maybe Bed, Bath, & Beyond, I don't know, I don't know if we'll have enough time.” This is meant to poke fun at the franchise's dominant suburban locations.

Bed Bath & Beyond is sometimes included in the Food Network television show Good Eats. Alton Brown visits a BBB location and gathers useful gadgets.

The "Beyond" department is also used in Adam Sandler and Christopher Walken's 2006 comedy film Click. In this case, the door marked "Beyond" leads to a workshop helmed by Walken, with a door marked "Way Beyond" leading way to a massive storage unit.