Levi’s has been undergoing a turnaround for the better part of the past decade under Mr. Bergh, who joined the company in 2011. The company, based in San Francisco, has yet to return to its peak of the 1990s, but the executive has overseen an increase in sales to $5.6 billion last year, with net profit of $285 million.

[Being publicly traded is the latest chapter in the story of the 165-year-old company.]

“The job is not done, but this is a big step and acknowledgment of the progress that we’ve made,” Mr. Bergh said. “The vision I had was to be and be seen as the world’s best apparel company — and among the best companies in any industry — in part because that’s what the company was in the ’60s, ’70s and ’80s.”

The company was founded by Levi Strauss, who immigrated to the United States from Bavaria and set up shop in San Francisco in 1853 with a wholesale dry goods business. Twenty years later, he and a business partner received a patent for “waist overalls” with metal rivets at points of strain — a garment known today as the blue jean.