SAN FRANCISCO (AP) – The founder of the Gap clothing store chain said Tuesday he is stepping down as chairman of the company he started 34 years ago as a frustrated shopper trying to find better-fitting pair of jeans.

Donald Fisher, 75, will relinquish the chairman’s title to his son Robert, a former Gap executive, after the San Francisco-based company’s annual meeting in May.

He intends to remain on the board as chairman emeritus and continue to advise Gap’s chief executive officer, Paul Pressler, whom Fisher recruited in 2002 to lift the company out of a funk.

The shakeup has paid off so far. The company ended a 29-month-long sales slump shortly after Pressler’s arrival and has now increased its same-store sales – a key measure of a merchant’s health – for 14 consecutive months.

“I’m more confident than ever about our company’s long-term prospects,” Fisher said. “I believe now is an appropriate time to make this transition as chairman.”

The company’s stock has gained nearly 70 percent since Pressler’s arrival, helping to enrich Fisher’s personal fortune. Fisher and his wife, Doris, hold a 19 percent stake in Gap, worth $3.6 billion as of Tuesday.

Gap’s shares fell 16 cents Tuesday to close at $20.78 on the New York Stock Exchange.

Fisher got the idea for the store after receiving a pair of Levi’s jeans that didn’t fit him back in 1969, when he was a 41-year-old real estate developer. When he went to a local department store to return the jeans, Fisher observed the mishmash of ill-fitting clothes in the store and thought he could come up with a better approach.

Later that year, with a $63,000 investment, he opened his first Gap store in San Francisco, focusing on selling pants by size instead of style, and neatly stacking clothes in wall cubicles.

Since then, Gap has grown into a 3,070-store empire with annual sales of about $15 billion.

Besides the stores bearing its name, Gap also owns the Old Navy and Banana Republic chains.