Public store

“ Most of the great wholesale and retail houses, banks, theaters, hotels, and public buildings are crowded into this area, and here is the largest department store in the world, in which over 9000 people work. ”

“ We do everything we can to popularize this store, not only with the stockholders, but with the general public. You see, we have both a dry and green grocery department, a meat and a fish department. On Saturdays we have a special sale, known as the ‘no rebate and no delivery sale,’ which runs from five to ten P. M. This is so popular as a matter of economy with Montclair people that we have great crowds during those hours, many customers arriving at four-thirty and waiting the half hour till specials are on sale. ”

“ No other branch of business can bear comparison with the wonderful results achieved by Department Stores, such a success as has made them the wonder of modern merchandising. These stores, that have grown to greatness from small beginnings, have a force and power behind them that commands general interest. Their store-keeping rests upon certain well-defined principles, and not upon chance, sensations or experiments. ”

“ Into the quiet of his office filtered a hum of activity exquisite to his ears, the clicking of billing-machines, the whirr of parcel-carriers, the sound of customers’ voices, buying merchandise. Out there the store was smoothly functioning, supplying modern civilization to ten thousand men and women. And it was his store! Not only did he reap the profit—that was a small part of his pleasure. It was his personality which gave all those people the opportunity to satisfy their needs, that was educating them to desire better things. ”

“ I have been privileged with some intimate glances into the greatest of those peculiarly American institutions, the big departmental stores. Materially it is an immense building, containing all things that any upper-middle-class person could conceivably want. Such a store includes even Art, with the same bland omnipotence. ”

“ Here, then, is the receiving department of this great single retailing machine of modern business. It keeps over three hundred human units constantly upon the move—and, mind you, all that these people are doing is merely making the merchandise ready to sell. The next step is the final one before actual sale; the display of proffered goods—upon the counters and within the plate-glass windows along the street frontages.
This, in the modern department-store, is considered a feature of the utmost importance, and nowhere more so than at Macy's. ”

“ The first aim is to get the best and choicest goods direct from the makers; and, second, to have the lowest prices, thus enlarging the purchasing power of every dollar. A Department Store is different from the ordinary store, by being big enough to deal in almost everything that people need; handling merchandise of every class that goes [Pg 8] well together for all sorts of people; providing the means of doing everything quickly, easily, cheaply.
A store large enough to accommodate thousands of shoppers arranged to serve a purpose. ”

“ Therefore, kind friends, take pride in the Department Store of your town and see to it that it is patronized in a liberal manner by rich and poor alike, and if the storekeeper be but the right sort of a merchant, and one disposed to build up a large trade by small profit inducements, you will soon discover that the town center has changed its base, and that the threshold of the Department Store is now the hub from which all people radiate. ”

“ The plate glass windows of every store lay in thousands of pieces below their sashes, and the entire stock of merchandise whether furniture or drapery, groceries or dairy products, had been hurled through them into the middle of the thoroughfare. Above these were piled pell-mell bedding and chairs, wardrobes and wash basins, all splintered and broken—the whole making the most pitiable conglomeration I ever hope to witness. ”

“ It is evident that many of the thousands now fighting their way into the great shops must be indulging in the latter delight. At a moment when real wants are reduced to a minimum, how else account for the congestion of the department store? ”

“ Most people think that the department store is a product of the big city, but I think it is a development of the general store of the country town. We found a place where they sold everything from handkerchiefs to plows, and wandered about happily, looking at farm implements whose use we did not even guess, and wonderful displays of crockery and printed calico. We seemed to create quite a sensation when we came in although there were other people in the store. The proprietor came forward hurriedly and asked us what we wanted. ”

“ Her principal work is to trot around in other stores and learn all she can about their 'specials' and prices, and get all the information possible in order to keep her employers posted on what their rivals are doing, and besides that she is expected to prowl around this store at irregular intervals, and we are not supposed to know that she isn't a legitimate customer. ”

“ The shops, with the exception of the Louvre, the Bon Marché, and one or two of the large department stores of similar scope, are all small—tiny, in fact, and exploit but one or two things. A little shop for fans will be next to a milliner who makes a specialty of nothing but gauze theatre bonnets. Perhaps next will come a linen store, where the windows will have nothing but the most fascinating embroidery, handkerchiefs, and neckware. Then comes the man who sells belts of every description, and parasol handles. ”

“ It will not be long before the alderman’s little boy will come out on the sidewalk and shoot off a Roman candle, and then the policeman will strike; a city ordinance will be carried out, and a little boy carried in.
A man steps up to a salesman in a fancy goods store.
“I want to get something,” he says, “for my wife’s mother. I think—”
“James,” calls the salesman, “show this gentleman the 5-cent counter.” Merchants who make a study of their customers are quick to know what they want.
A man who is unmistakably a clergyman goes into a grocery store that is next door to a saloon. ”

“ At the beginning we can make assertion that in the entire history of retail selling no more ingenious scheme has been devised for the orderly and rapid movement of goods in and out of a department-store. ”

“ Sweeping should be avoided as much as possible during the day, but the departments at all times must be neat and clean in appearance. They should not allow cash boys or parcel boys to loiter in their division, and should see that all customers are properly served, and [Pg 41] the greatest courtesy and politeness shown them, whether buying or simply looking at goods. Strangers from out of town visiting the store should be made to feel at home, and particular attention paid them. ”

“ They are a part of her business capital, which she can—and does—turn to the good account of the store. So she is to her compeer of twenty-five years ago—selling dress-goods in the old Macy store down on Fourteenth Street—as the electric light of today is to the old-fashioned lamps of that day and generation.
Back of this little black-bound notebook there is [Pg 221] system—organization if you would read it that way. Education, of a truth, has become the handmaiden of merchandising. And the store's school has become one of its ranking functions. ”

“ If another customer came along they’d have to stop in the middle of a sale and refer him to a clerk around in the other aisle.
“A furnishing goods department should be continuous. The sale of a shirt will lead to the purchase of a tie or a collar or hosiery. The goods should be in sight so that they automatically suggest themselves.
“You enter this store and the first impression you get is a big clothing store. That is what you want. Clothing dominates the store. Furnishing goods and hats are important and necessary side lines. ”

“ During their conversation the shopkeeper's eyes wandered continually to the big store on the other side of the street; the huge gilded letters of the name 'Monopole Stores' seemed to have an irresistible attraction for him. ”

“ The department store is as much a labor-saving device as a steam engine or the telegraph and telephone. One as much as the other is a product of industrial evolution. Like the mediæval fair or the modern market, the department store is a segregation of commodities and of buyers and sellers. ”

“ Dozens, hundreds, perhaps a [Pg 103] thousand or more shoppers still are left within the store. Each is to be accorded a full opportunity to finish his or her transactions. There is no hurry; no ostensible hurry, at any rate. It would not be good-breeding to hasten the customer upon his way. And a canon of good merchandising is good breeding.
Gradually, however, the late-stayers eliminate themselves. The big doors open to let them out, but never again this day to let newcomers in. No rule of the house is observed more inexorably. And so gradually the store empties itself. ”

“ He believes that cooperative business solves the bulk of our high cost of living problem, and he has developed many good ideas. He has tried out the parcel-post plan of shipment and secured direct dealings with farmers. The 125 store is simply fitted, but immaculately clean, and the white-washed cellar, dry and sweet smelling, is a joy to the women who get a peep into it. ”

“ See, there are actually three streets already, two stores, three saloons, a barber shop, and a reading and pool room; and I understand that a fellow has just arrived who is going to open a clothing store, and another is on his way with medicines for a drug store. We are bound to boom! ”

“ A country store is an indescribable collection of miscellanies,—groceries, drygoods, hardware, earthenware, and stoneware, cups and saucers, plates and dishes, coffee and tea, sugar and molasses, boots and shoes, whiskey and lead, butter and eggs, tobacco and gunpowder, with an endless list of things unimaginable except by a housewife or a "merchant." Such was the store to the charge of which Abe was now promoted,—promoted from the rank of a common laborer to be a sort of brevet clerk. ”

“ It always happened so after New Years; and the stagnation steadily increased as spring approached, until by summer time the retail business was practically dead.
But a quiet market did not mean that there was nothing for her to do. Warehouse sales must be watched, auctions, public and private, in town and country, must be attended by one or more of her representatives; private clients inclined to sell always required tactful handling and careful consideration; her confidential agents must always be alert. ”

“ This gives us a chance 130 to sell off all vegetables and other perishable foodstuffs that otherwise must be carried over the week-end. I mention it merely to show you that a cooperative store is not necessarily high-brow, as some women think. We try to follow all modern business methods—but we permit no substitution, adulteration, nor any other of the evils of so-called modern merchandising. ”

“ Many of the girls and boys who read this little book live in or near one of the great cities where they have huge department stores. I love to visit a big store. I have spent hours, more likely days, if I should count up all the time, in Wanamaker's in New York and Philadelphia, Marshall Field's in Chicago, Hengerer's in Buffalo, and Eaton's in Toronto. Any season of the year, and almost any hour of the day, these stores are thronged with people, for people like to go to the big store. ”

“ Nothing seems easier than to take a book from one store, to carry it to another store six or eight miles away and sell it, then to wash your hands of the whole matter. Nothing in reality is harder. All the bookstore keepers of every large city are bound together in a loosely organized society for mutual protection. ”

“ The people of the town will tell the prospective merchant that the town is already overcrowded with stores, that none of the stores seem to be making more than a bare living, and that it would be impossible for another store to make a success, on account of the already overcrowded conditions, yet the right man comes along and starts a store in that town and makes a marked success. ”

“ An American store is generally a very extensive apartment, handsomely decorated, the roof frequently supported on marble pillars. The owner or clerk is seen seated by his goods, absorbed in the morning paper—probably balancing himself on one leg of his chair, with a spittoon by his side. He deigns to answer your inquiries, but, in place of the pertinacious perseverance with which an English shop man displays his wares, it seems a matter of perfect indifference to the American whether you purchase or no. ”

“ The failure of the so-called department store in new and growing communities to prevent differentiation and segregation is not difficult to explain. In such communities the retail trade is not, as a rule, in the hands of men of commanding ability and enterprise, alert to seize every opportunity to extend their business. ”

“ And stay they have, to this very day, even though most of the New York stores still retain men to a considerable extent in some of their departments—notably those devoted to the sale of furniture, dress-goods and boots and shoes. ”

“ While it is true that large department stores reap many of the advantages and employ many of the methods of a chain store group, such as large capital, buying in quantity, and the ability to command the highest type of management, it is nevertheless evident that, whereas a department store spreads its efforts over a number of different sorts of shops under one roof, the chain store owner concentrates its energy upon the conduct of but one kind of stores located in many neighborhoods. ”