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 Exterior of the former flagshipJohn Wanamaker Store (2022) | |
| Company type | Subsidiary |
|---|---|
| Industry | Retail |
| Genre | Department stores |
| Founded | 1861; 164 years ago (1861) inPhiladelphia,Pennsylvania, United States |
| Founder | John Wanamaker |
| Defunct | 1995; 30 years ago (1995) |
| Fate | Acquisition byThe May Department Stores Company |
| Successor | Hecht's |
| Headquarters | John Wanamaker Store, 1300Market Street, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States |
Number of locations | 16 (at peak) |
Area served | Delaware Valley |
| Products |
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| Parent |
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Wanamaker's was an Americandepartment store chain founded in 1861 byJohn Wanamaker. It was one of the first department stores in the United States, and peaked at 16 locations along theDelaware Valley in the 20th century. Wanamaker's was purchased byA. Alfred Taubman, who previously purchased theWashington, D.C. department storeWoodward & Lothrop, in 1986.[1] The store was acquired from bankruptcy byThe May Department Stores Company in 1994, and converted all remaining Wanamaker's stores toHecht's in 1995.
Wanamaker's was influential in the development of theretail industry including as the first store to use price tags.[2]
John Wanamaker was born inPhiladelphia,Pennsylvania, in 1838. Due to a persistent cough, he was unable to join theU.S. Army to fight in theAmerican Civil War, so instead started a career in business.[citation needed]
In 1861, he and his brother-in-law Nathan Brown founded a men's clothing store in Philadelphia called Oak Hall. Wanamaker carried on the business alone after Brown's death in 1868. Eight years later, Wanamaker purchased the abandonedPennsylvania Railroad station for use as a new, larger retail location. The concept was to renovate the terminal into a "Grand Depot" similar to London'sRoyal Exchange or Paris'sLes Halles and forerunners of the modern department store that were well known in Europe at that time.[citation needed]
The Wanamaker's Grand Depot opened in time to service the public visiting Philadelphia for the AmericanCentennial Exposition of 1876, and in fact resembled one of the many pavilions at that world's fair because of its fanciful newMoorish Revival façade. In 1877, the interior of Wanamaker's was refurbished and expanded to include not only men's clothing, but women's clothing anddry goods as well. This was Philadelphia's first modern-day department store, and one of the earliest founded in America. A circular counter was placed at the center of the building, and concentric circles radiated around it with 129 counters of goods. The store also accepted mail orders, though it was not a large business until the early twentieth century.[3][4]
Wanamaker first thought of how he would run a store on new principles when, as a youth, a merchant refused his request to exchange a purchase. A practicingChristian, he chose not to advertise on Sundays. Before he opened his Grand Depot for retail business, he letevangelistDwight L. Moody use its facilities as a meeting place, while Wanamaker provided 300 ushers from his store personnel. His retail advertisements—the first to be copyrighted beginning in 1874—were factual, and promises made in them were kept.[citation needed]
Wanamaker guaranteed the quality of his merchandise in print, allowed his customers to return purchases for a cash refund and offered the first restaurant to be located inside a department store. Wanamaker also invented the price tag.[5]
His employees were to be treated respectfully by management (including not being scolded in public), and John Wanamaker & Company offered its employees access to the John Wanamaker Commercial Institute, as well as free medical care, recreational facilities, profit sharing plans, and pensions—long before these types of benefits were considered standard in corporate employment.[citation needed]
Innovation and "firsts" marked Wanamaker's. The store was the first department store withelectrical illumination (1878), first store with atelephone (1879), and the first store to installpneumatic tubes to transport cash and documents (1880).
Wanamaker's commissioned a Philadelphia/New Jersey artist,George Washington Nicholson (1832–1912), to paint a large landscape mural, "The Old Homestead", which was finished in March 1892. The 7-by-14-foot (2.1 by 4.3 m) mural was still owned by Wanamaker's in 1950, but has since passed into a private collection.
The existing Grand Depot was razed and replaced with the flagshipJohn Wanamaker Store in 1911. News of theTitanic's sinking was transmitted to Wanamaker'swireless station inNew York City, and given to anxious crowds waiting outside—yet another first for an American retail store. Public Christmas Caroling in the store's Grand Court began in 1918.
In 1919,El Mundo, a Spanish newspaper, reported that Wanamaker's New York store had 100 specialized departments all under one roof, including aEl Departamento de Latino-Americano de Servicio Personal (The Department of Personal Service for Latin-Americans).[6]
Other innovations included employing buyers to travel overseas to Europe each year for the latest fashions, the firstWhite sale (1878) and other themed sales such as the February "Opportunity Sales" to keep prices as low as possible while keeping volume high. The store also broadcast its organ concerts on the Wanamaker-owned radio stationWOO beginning in 1922. Under the leadership of James Bayard Woodford, Wanamaker's opened piano stores in Philadelphia and New York that did a huge business with an innovative fixed-price system of sales. Salons in period decor were used to sell the higher-price items. Wanamaker also tried selling small organs built by theAustin Organ Company for a time.
After John Wanamaker's death in 1922, the business carried on under Wanamaker family ownership.Rodman Wanamaker, John's son, enhanced the reputation of the stores as artistic centers and temples of the beautiful, offering imported luxuries from around the world. After his death in 1928, the stores (managed for the family by a trust) continued to thrive for a time. The men's clothing and accessories department was expanded into its own separate store on the lower floors of theLincoln-Liberty Building, two doors down on Chestnut Street, in 1932. This building, which also had a private apartment for the Wanamaker family on its top floor, was sold toPhiladelphia National Bank in 1952; the initials on the building's crown read "PNB" until November 2014, even though the bank no longer existed.[7]
In the late 20th century, Wanamaker's lost business to other retail chains, includingBloomingdale's andMacy's, in the Philadelphia market. The Wanamaker Family Trust finally sold John Wanamaker and Company, with its underpatronized stores, to Los Angeles-basedCarter Hawley Hale Stores for US$60 million (~$226 million in 2024) cash in 1978.[8] Carter Hawley Hale poured another $80 million into renovating the stores,[9] but to no avail—customers had gone elsewhere in the intervening decades and did not come back.
In late 1986, the now 15-store chain was sold toWoodward & Lothrop, owned byDetroit shopping-mall magnateA. Alfred Taubman, for around $180 million (~$436 million in 2024).[10] Taubman reorganized the business with a shortened corporate name (Wanamaker's Inc.), and poured millions more into store renovations and public relations campaigns. This too was no help, as Taubman's retail interests were heavily in debt and the stores' combined sales were a disappointment.
Woodward & Lothrop collapsed in bankruptcy, filing for Chapter 11 on January 17, 1994. The Wanamaker's chain was sold toMay Department Stores Company on June 21, 1995. Wanamaker's Inc. was formally dissolved, and operations were consolidated with May'sHecht's division in Arlington, Virginia. After 133 consecutive years, the Wanamaker's name was removed from all stores and replaced withHecht's. In 1996, May acquired Wanamaker's historic rivalStrawbridge & Clothier[11] and re-branded allPhiladelphia-area Hecht's locations as Strawbridge's, including the Center City flagship. The building closed soon after for renovation and refurbishment, which saw the retail space reduced in size again to three floors, with two more upper floors converted to commercial office space. The flagship structure was sold again in early 1997, to Amerimar Realty. The retail portion reopened in August 1997 as a branch of New York-basedLord & Taylor, another division ofMay Department Stores.[12] In August 2006 the store was converted toMacy's, operated by the Macy's East Division of Federated Department Stores Inc., nowMacy's, Inc., which acquired May in late 2005. The former New York Wanamaker's store on Broadway had retail space occupied byKmart by 1996, and laterWegmans (2023).
The store was not immune to the major change in retailing away from regional chains to national chains. The uniformity of brand offerings and the cost savings available to national chains all worked against the viability of the store as an independent personality, although customers generally had a major say in determining store offerings and the magnificence of its commercial space did tend to cause it to be stocked with better offerings. Other retailers had also learned to offer goods with much smaller staff rosters. The ability of retailers to go national in opposition to regional tastes is still an experiment-in-progress with mixed results.
Wanamaker's opened a store inWilmington, Delaware in 1950.[13] After the New York store closed in 1954, Wanamaker's expanded to the Philadelphia suburbs, starting with theWynnewood store in December 1954.[13] The second suburban branch opened in 1958 inJenkintown, not far from theStrawbridge and Clothier store.[13] The store atMoorestown Mall opened in 1963.[13] Other prominent suburban branch stores includedKing of Prussia Mall (1963),Harrisburg Mall (1969),Berkshire Mall (1970),Oxford Valley Mall (1973),Springfield Mall (1974),Deptford Mall (1975),Roosevelt Mall (1976),[14]Lehigh Valley Mall (1976),Montgomery Mall (1977) andChristiana Mall (1991, last Wanamaker's store built).
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But in 1876, inspired by notions of equality, Quaker merchant John Wanamaker introduced price tags at the launch of his eponymous department store in Philadelphia.
