Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, June 23, 1995 TAG: 9506260035
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: A-9 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: PHILADELPHIA LENGTH: Medium
On the brink of the Civil War in 1861, the Union Army refused to admit a frail John Wanamaker.
Undeterred for long, the 22-year-old Philadelphian began a revolution of his own. He opened the world's first urban department store. He sank his first day's sales of $24.67 into advertising; he coined the term ``white sale''; and he offered customers a return-exchange policy for the first time.
He built a grand, pillared store downtown that was dedicated in 1911 by President William Howard Taft.
After 134 years, however, it looks as if the Wanamaker name is about to disappear.
Woodward & Lothrop, a Washington department-store company that bought Wanamaker's in 1986 but has since entered bankruptcy reorganization, said Wednesday it will sell the 14 Wanamaker stores in the Philadelphia area to three retail giants and a real estate developer.
All four buyers plan to rename the Wanamaker's stores.
Most painful, the flagship store - the largest building in Philadelphia even today - will carry the name Macy's, according to Federated Department Stores Inc. of Cincinnati.
Wanamaker's was the first to make shopping fun, said Rolph Anderson, a marketing expert with Drexel University.
For more than 80 years, generations of Philadelphians gathered in the seven-story-high Grand Hall to hear Christmas shows featuring the world's largest organ, purchased at the Louisiana Exposition in 1904 and installed in 1911. Three daily concerts have been performed since the store opened.
``When my family came to see the light show, the whole place here was wall to wall with strollers,'' said shopper Rebecca Weiler, who has been coming to Wanamaker's for decades. ``The organ is my fondest memory. I love the show tunes. It's romantic.'' The store offers another landmark - a 7,000-pound bronze eagle, also bought in St. Louis. It is a favorite meeting spot for shoppers.
Anderson called Wanamaker with many innovations in retail.
``the P.T. Barnum of retail business. He ... sent up a 20-foot balloon, hung a 100-foot banner over the front of the store, drove an elaborate horse and carriage and handed out handbills. He gave away sales promotion items with his name on them,'' Anderson said.
``He's the biggest retailing name before Sam Walton of Wal-Mart.'' Anderson said. ``I hate to have them change the name. It's synonymous with retail.''
Wanamaker had a strong influence on retailing and customer service. In 1865, he established guaranteed refunds and a one-price-for-everyone system instead of haggling over every item, the prevailing practice. He opened a mail-order bureau in 1876. He was the first in the world to establish day and night telephone order service, in 1907.
``Wanamaker is the biggest, creative innovative genius,'' Anderson said. ``These other stores just don't have the pizazz that brings children in.''
Even one of the competitors buying six stores spoke with sadness about the end of the era.
Francis Strawbridge, chairman of Strawbridge & Clothier, a Philadelphia-based rival founded the same year as Wanamaker's, said his forefathers and the founders of Wanamaker's had similar beginnings. But because family members still hold a majority of the Strawbridge & Clothier stock, they have outlasted Wanamaker's, he said.
``It's sad because Wanamaker's is such an institution and name in Philadelphia,'' he said.
Strawbridge & Clothier will give the stores the Strawbridge name. Boscov's will name its two stores Boscov's. The real estate developer, Rubin Organization Inc., will rename the five stores it is buying, but it hasn't disclosed the new name.
Woodward & Lothrop is not releasing details of the purchase agreement but said the store sales and anticipated sales of other assets are expected to generate $640 million. The corporation had liabilities totaling about $595 million as of January.
by CNB