Tim Hortons Inc. The company was founded in in Hamilton, Ontario by Canadian ice hockey player Tim Horton — and Jim Charade — , [ 10 ] after an initial venture in hamburger restaurants. Joyce expanded the chain into a multi-billion dollar franchise. Charade left the organization in and briefly returned in and through The Wendy's Company merged with Tim Hortons in and operated it under their flagship subsidiary until The business was founded by Tim Horton , who played in the National Hockey League from until his death in an auto crash in Soon after Horton opened the store, he met Ron Joyce , a former police constable in Hamilton.
By , after opening two additional stores, the two became full partners. The th store opened in Joyce's aggressive expansion of the business resulted in major changes to the Canadian coffee and donut restaurant market. Many independent donut shops and small chains were driven out of business, while Canada's per-capita ratio of donut shops surpassed that of all other countries. The company had originally been incorporated as Tim Donut Limited. This was an effort by the company to diversify the business, removing the primary emphasis on donuts, and continuing the expansion of the menu options as consumer tastes broadened.
Some older locations retain signage with the company's name, including a possessive apostrophe, despite the fact that the official styling of the company's name has been Tim Hortons without an apostrophe for at least a decade. Although a number of Quebec locations have bilingual menu boards, the decision to have both Canadian official languages represented is left to the discretion of individual franchise owners. Some Quebec locations have French-only menu boards. Murphy, decided to open new franchise outlets for both brands in the same building in the town of Montague.
Murphy invited Joyce and Wendy's chairman Dave Thomas to the grand opening of the "combo store," where the two executives met for the first time. Murphy's success with combining coffee and donuts with Wendy's fast food led to the August 8, , acquisition of and merger with TDL Group by Wendy's International, Inc.
The sale was widely commented on in the media. In , the Toronto Star had a column reflecting on Tim Hortons "selling out" to Wendy's with "the spectacle of another great Canadian icon Tim Hortons franchises spread rapidly and eventually overtook McDonald's as Canada's largest food service operator. On June 29, , Tim Hortons Inc. The change was being made primarily for tax purposes.
