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"This is the first beautifully illustrated book on department stores, with photographs and ephemera from all over the world. Born in the Gilded Age in France, the department store grew up thanks to the industrial revolution, the rise of the middle class, and the invention of steel-frame architecture and the elevator. Spectacular entrances led to marble staircases and floor after floor of merchandise and amenities. These emporiums also inspired a whole new way of merchandising: shopping became an entertainment rather than a laborious grind; posters and advertisements were made by the great artists of the time; and elaborate shop windows attracted thousands of people during the holidays. The department store quickly spread through Europe and Asia and then the New World, and great architects were employed to build these temples of consumerism, where dreams were created and then fulfilled"--
Publisher Description
Michael J. Lisicky is the author of several bestselling books, including Hutzler's: Where Baltimore Shops. In demand as a department store historian, he has given lectures at institutions such as the New York Public Library, the Boston Public Library, the Free Library of Philadelphia, the Historical Society of Pennsylvania, the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh, the Milwaukee County Historical Society, the Enoch Pratt Free Library and the Jewish Museum of Maryland. His books have received critical acclaim from the Baltimore Sun, Baltimore City Paper, Philadelphia Inquirer, Philadelphia Daily News, Boston Globe, Boston Herald, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and Pittsburgh Post Gazette. He has been interviewed by national business periodicals including Fortune Magazine, Investor's Business Daily and Bloomberg Businessweek. His book Gimbels Has It was recommended by National Public Radio's Morning Edition program as "One of the Freshest Reads of 2011." Mr. Lisicky helps run an "Ask the Expert" column with author Jan Whitaker at www.departmentstorehistory.net and resides in Baltimore, where he is an oboist with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra.
In the late nineteenth century, San Francisco's merchant princes built grand stores for a booming city, each with its own niche. For the eager clientele, a trip downtown meant dressing up--hats, gloves and stockings required--and going to Blum's for Coffee Crunch cake or Townsend's for creamed spinach. The I. Magnin empire catered to a selective upper-class clientele, while middle-class shoppers loved the Emporium department store with its Bargain Basement and Santa for the kids. Gump's defined good taste, the City of Paris satisfied desires for anything French and edgy, youth-oriented Joseph Magnin ensnared the younger shoppers with the latest trends. Join author Anne Evers Hitz as she looks back at the colorful personalities that created six major stores and defined shopping in San Francisco.
The geography of American retail has changed dramatically since the first luxurious department stores sprang up in nineteenth-century cities. Introducing light, color, and music to dry-goods emporia, these "palaces of consumption" transformed mere trade into occasions for pleasure and spectacle. Through the early twentieth century, department stores remained centers of social activity in local communities. But after World War II, suburban growth and the ubiquity of automobiles shifted the seat of economic prosperity to malls and shopping centers. The subsequent rise of discount big-box stores and electronic shopping accelerated the pace at which local department stores were shuttered or absorbed by national chains. But as the outpouring of nostalgia for lost downtown stores and historic shopping districts would indicate, these vibrant social institutions were intimately connected to American political, cultural, and economic identities. The first national study of the department store industry, From Main Street to Mall traces the changing economic and political contexts that transformed the American shopping experience in the twentieth century. With careful attention to small-town stores as well as glamorous landmarks such as Marshall Field's in Chicago and Wanamaker's in Philadelphia, historian Vicki Howard offers a comprehensive account of the uneven trajectory that brought about the loss of locally identified department store firms and the rise of national chains like Macy's and J. C. Penney. She draws on a wealth of primary source evidence to demonstrate how the decisions of consumers, government policy makers, and department store industry leaders culminated in today's Wal-Mart world. Richly illustrated with archival photographs of the nation's beloved downtown business centers, From Main Street to Mall shows that department stores were more than just places to shop.
How a pioneering merchant blended religion and business to create a unique American shopping experience On Christmas Eve, 1911, John Wanamaker stood in the middle of his elaborately decorated department store building in Philadelphia as shoppers milled around him picking up last minute Christmas presents. On that night, as for years to come, the store was filled with the sound of Christmas carols sung by thousands of shoppers, accompanied by the store’s Great Organ. Wanamaker recalled that moment in his diary, “I said to myself that I was in a temple,” a sentiment quite possibly shared by the thousands who thronged the store that night. Remembered for his store’s extravagant holiday decorations and displays, Wanamaker built one of the largest retailing businesses in the world and helped to define the American retail shopping experience. From the freedom to browse without purchase and the institution of one price for all customers to generous return policies, he helped to implement retailing conventions that continue to define American retail to this day. Wanamaker was also a leading Christian leader, participating in the major Protestant moral reform movements from his youth until his death in 1922. But most notably, he found ways to bring his religious commitments into the life of his store. He focused on the religious and moral development of his employees, developing training programs and summer camps to build their character, while among his clientele he sought to cultivate a Christian morality through decorum and taste. Wanamaker’s Temple examines how and why Wanamaker blended business and religion in his Philadelphia store, offering a historical exploration of the relationships between religion, commerce, and urban life in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century and illuminating how they merged in unexpected and public ways. Wanamaker's marriage of religion and retail had a pivotal role in the way American Protestantism was expressed and shaped in American life, and opened a new door for the intertwining of personal values with public commerce.
The book includes translations of 125 documents from the various investigations of the Kirov murder, allowing readers to reach their own conclusions about Stalin's involvement in the assassination. --
Daytons department store, grand in scope and company spirit, enjoyed a century in the limelight as one of the nations leading retailers. Its disappearance has been a challenge to the community, but it is a sign of the times, as many other urban department stores have shared the same fate. Originally called Goodfellows, the store got its start in 1902 when real estate investor and banker George Draper Dayton became a silent partner in the business. He soon took over the company but had to learn the ropes of retail as he went along since he had never intended to become a merchant. The early years were not without struggles, but Daytons department store was nevertheless an instant hit with its daylight-filled aisles, generous return policies, and quality merchandise. The Minneapolis store became a vibrant self-contained community with a post office, newspaper, infirmary, laundry, bakery, and even a college. Daytonians worked and played together around the clock, in baseball and bowling teams, glee clubs, and orchestras. Over time, the reach of Daytons extended far into the upper Midwest, with stores in North Dakota, South Dakota, and Wisconsin, including the development of the nations first indoor mall.
Where, under one roof, can shoppers find Chanel, Yves Saint Laurent, Prada, Vivienne Westwood and Alexander McQueen? And where, besides the great department stores of Europe, Japan and America, is it possible for shoppers to spend the day in an extraordinarily opulent setting, drifting from shoes to cosmetics with a stop for a light lunch on the seventh floor and a visit to the bookstore, florist or hairdresser? This is the first illustrated book on department stores, with photographs and ephemera collected from all over the world. Born in the Gilded Age in France, the department store grew up thanks to the Industrial Revolution, the rise of the middle classes, and the invention of steel-frame architecture and the elevator. This lavish book goes behind the fabulous window displays, eye-catching shopping bags and instore extravaganzas promoting everything from shoes to perfumes to the latest fashion sensation to reveal and celebrate the department store in richness and detail.
In this book, Traci Parker examines the movement to racially integrate white-collar work and consumption in American department stores, and broadens our understanding of historical transformations in African American class and labor formation. Built on the goals, organization, and momentum of earlier struggles for justice, the department store movement channeled the power of store workers and consumers to promote black freedom in the mid-twentieth century. Sponsoring lunch counter sit-ins and protests in the 1950s and 1960s, and challenging discrimination in the courts in the 1970s, this movement ended in the early 1980s with the conclusion of the Sears, Roebuck, and Co. affirmative action cases and the transformation and consolidation of American department stores. In documenting the experiences of African American workers and consumers during this era, Parker highlights the department store as a key site for the inception of a modern black middle class, and demonstrates the ways that both work and consumption were battlegrounds for civil rights.