Sears Catalog
A former railroad employee, R.W. Sears got into the retail business almost by accident, when he purchased a shipment of watches from a disgruntled wholesaler who had received an incorrect order. Advertising his watches by flyers and mail-­‐order catalogs, Sears quickly turned a profit on his investment and within a year had founded his own company, initially selling only watches. He soon was joined in the venture by Alvah Roebuck, and in 1893 Sears, Roebuck, and Co. was born. Targeting rural customers with little access to goods produced primarily in the east, and offering stable, straightforward pricing, Sears, Roebuck quickly expanded its business—and the number of pages in the annual catalog they sent to customers. It was on the back of the mail-­‐order business that Sears built his empire—in fact, he didn’t get around to opening an actual store until more than 30 years later. The company had a number of competitors, including Montgomery Ward, Hammacher Schlemmer and others, but it was the Sears catalog that became an American icon. By the early 20th century, the Sears catalog had become so entwined with the American psyche that the government began to use it for propaganda purposes at home and abroad. During the World Wars, thousands of catalogs were sent to American soldiers at the front and convalescing in foreign hospitals to bring them a taste of home. President Franklin Roosevelt famously said that the best way to combat communism was to give them a good dollop of capitalism in the form of Sears catalogs. The Soviets took note—in 1981 they selected that year’s catalog as one of 300 works put on display in a cultural exhibit meant to inform the Soviet public about America. The Sears catalog was around for so many years, it’s perhaps not surprising that a number of famous Americans were featured in its pages. Several aspiring actresses got their start modeling in the catalog, including silent film star Gloria Swanson, femme fatales Susan Hayward and Lauren Bacall and even supermodel Cheryl Tiegs. R.W. Sears famously wrote every line of copy in the early issues, but after he retired the task fell to a series of writers, including author Edgar Rice Burroughs, who went on to later fame as the creator or Tarzan. During the Great Depression, artist Norman Rockwell created a series of paintings for the catalogs’ covers. And even big-­‐screen cowboys and famous athletes, like Roy Rogers and Ted Williams, were recruited to hawk the latest products. In addition to being a cultural touchstone, the catalog was big, big business. By 1931, in the midst of the Great Depression, Sears’ catalog and retail businesses generated annual profits of more than $2.5 billion in today’s money, and within the next decade, the company’s sales accounted for more than 1 percent of U.S. gross national product. Here are just a few examples of some of the hundreds and hundreds of items you could buy through the Sears, Roebuck catalog. Early Entertainment Systems The folks at Sears, Roebuck were early adopters of modern technology. Almost as soon as they hit the market, consumers could order gizmos and gadgets like Thomas Edison’s gramophone, radios and televisions. Millions of Americans were first introduced to moving images through devices bought at Sears, including the chromatrope, which flashed a series of slides telling a narrative story, and the optigraph, one of the first electronic projection systems. And Sears had you covered if you wanted to open your own theater, with a kit that included projection screens, posters advertising the latest releases and pre-­‐stamped admission tickets. In 1914, they even began selling private electricity plants designed to generate electricity in rural areas. Touch and Feel Textiles By 1905, understanding that some items required more than just illustrations, Sears began incorporating physical samples of its products in the pages of the catalog. If you were in the market for paint, you could now choose your exact shade. If you wanted wallpaper, you could closely examine dozens of different patterns. And selecting a new suit was easy when you could touch and feel the weight and softness of the material. Mail-­‐Order Chickens and More That’s right, along with pantry staples such as flour, lard and butter, America’s housewives could stock their farms with animals sent right to their door. In addition, Sears stocked hundreds of different food items, and by the early 20th century, the catalog offered a wide variety of ethnic foods to cater to America’s growing immigrant population. You could send away for Jamaican ginger, canned frijoles, pickled pigs’ feet and a surprisingly wide variety of herrings and other fishes from Norway, Sweden and Scotland. Human-­‐ and Motor-­‐Powered Vehicles Today, Sears continues to be a pioneer in auto parts and tools, but from the 1920s onward, you could buy the vehicles themselves from the pages of the catalog. Over its history, the company offered everything from bicycles, wagons and tractors to motorcycles and even a series of automobiles that included early motor buggies and the more advanced “Allstate” brand of sedans, many of which were made to order. Tombstones, Monuments and Mortuary Stones Sears even took care of their customers’ needs in the afterlife. Special inserts, which could run more than 50 pages, offered the latest in funerary finery. The catalog featured simple, elegant headstones in marble of varying qualities and everything from elaborate monuments to honor entire families to pillars with and without animals carved on top to massive crosses and shamrock-­‐shaped tombstones. (They helpfully included a list of Bible verses in the back pages to simplify your selection.) Pills, Potions and Prescriptions Thumbing through the pages of old Sears catalogs, one can find a plethora of ailments and potential cures. Take arsenic wafers for a clear complexion or order opiates to cure jangling nerves. Peruse ads for potions and creams that claimed to increase your bust size, right alongside ones that promised to reduce them. For every dubious medical offering, there was a tried-­‐and-­‐true remedy like aspirin or Alka-­‐Seltzer. And with eye doctors in short supply on the prairie, Sears offered up a wide selection of eyewear. Not sure what your prescription was? Just take the at-­‐home eye test tucked into the catalog to determine your vision needs. Houses in (Thousands of) Boxes The mail-­‐order home kit, first advertised in the pages of the 1908 catalog, may be the most famous (and ambitious) of all Sears offerings. Initially, Sears got into the home-­‐kit business as a way of boosting sales in its slumping lumber department, but when interest boomed, they increased production, and soon offered more than two dozen different designs. All the prospective homeowner had to provide was the lot and the manpower—nails and tools were included in the kit. Sears eventually offered payment plans and even mortgages, but ended those financial practices after foreclosures skyrocketed during the Great Depression. Prices varied, with the most expensive designs ever produced costing roughly $55,000 in today’s money. Some of the more extravagant kits came with more than 30,000 individual pieces, and could be outfitted with the latest technology for an additional cost; optional upgrades included indoor plumping and central heating. Companies and communities often bought these houses in bulk, like Standard Oil did in 1919 when it created a town for its Carlin, Illinois, mineworkers that consisted entirely of 156 Sears homes. Eventually, more than 70,000 Americans built homes purchased through Sears, and today, thanks to their surprisingly good workmanship, thousands of them are still standing—including more than 200 in Elgin, Illinois, alone. Department Store
In 1923, The New York Times reported on the decline of the dressmaking business brought
about by the increasing popularity of women's ready-to-wear. The reporter interviewed the
executive chairman of the Associated Dress Industries of America, who spelled out the change in
women's buying habits. According to him, it was no wonder that women faced with the need to
acquire fabrics, trims, and notions used in making a garment; to find the time to work out the
design of the garment with the dressmaker; to schedule several fittings and alterations; and
finally to end up with a garment that "just screams 'home-made,' and does not bear that chic,
natty air of a garment designed, cut, and tailored by experienced craftsmen and artists," would
prefer shopping for a ready-made garment.
A woman buying a ready-made dress would have hundreds of garments to select from, in a
variety of colors and sizes. She could try the garment on before committing to it, and there was
no waiting or delay. It was "ready-to-wear."
At the turn of the twentieth century, advances in transportation, manufacturing technology, and
communications made it possible to establish department stores that sold large quantities of a
number of different items. Better manufacturing led to standardized production, thus lowering
the cost of goods. Faster transportation allowed merchants to receive their inventory more
quickly and frequently. The telephone enabled merchants to place their orders without delay,
thus allowing them to control their inventory levels closely—a factor that was critical to holding
down costs. Their reliance on new technologies let department store owners offer consumers
more choices at affordable prices.
The new department stores wanted the business of the general consumer, but they also catered
to women of wealth by offering high-quality and high-fashion dresses in lavish corners of the
store that echoed the homes and clubs to which these women were accustomed. Small specialty
shops arose to attract the same clientele. Both types of establishments offered alteration
services and some custom dressmaking to meet customers' demands, but neither could offer the
craftsmanship the Tirocchis could.
Anna Tirocchi had never aspired to serve the general public. Indeed, according to her niece
Primrose, she turned away potential customers who "did not appreciate what she was doing."
Nevertheless, she was alarmed when she realized that the new department and specialty retail
stores were enticing her clientele.
The shop records reveal that in the fall of 1923, Anna Tirocchi made a critical business decision
and began to offer her clients a wide range of ready-made garments and accessories, while
continuing to provide traditional dressmaking services. On occasion, clients requested that a
ready-made garment be copied. It is likely that many of Anna's older clients would have eased
into the ready-to-wear trend in this way, having been accustomed to having more creative input
in the choice of fabric, trimmings, and cut.
In shifting her business from pure custom dressmaking to a mix of custom and upscale readyto-wear, Madame Tirocchi saved the shop. Her business flourished, in fact. By 1927, customer
billings were triple what they had been in 1923, going from $22,706 to $62,221. The shop also
continued to be a full-service operation, providing alterations, repairs, and make-overs and
cleaning and pressing complicated garments.
This worked for a decade. By 1933, however, A. & L. Tirocchi was suffering. The Stock Market
Crash of 1929 and subsequent Great Depression began to take its toll on the clothing budgets of
the shop's customers. In reduced circumstances, clients found their dollars would go farther in
department stores. Retail advertising had convinced a new generation that fashionable ready-towear could be found in the stores, and the daughters of Madame Tirocchi's staunchest clients
found more choices there than in what must have seemed to them the outdated shop of their
mothers.
Anna and Laura had successfully fended off the tides of change with imagination and
determination, but they were unable to buck economic, generational, and retailing trends over
the long term. In the end, the department stores, with their ready-made wares, won.
Progressive Era and Consumer Protection
At the beginning of the 20th century, milk distributors frequently
adulterated milk by adding chalk or plaster to improve its color and
molasses and water to cut costs. Meatpackers killed rats by putting
poisoned pieces of bread on their floors; sometimes, the poisoned rats
made their way onto the production lines.
The publication of Upton Sinclair's book,The Jungle, exposed unsanitary
conditions in the meatpacking industry, generating widespread public
support for federal inspection of meatpacking plants. The Department of
Agriculture disclosed the dangers of chemical additives in canned foods. A
muckraking journalist named Samuel Hopkins uncovered misleading and
fraudulent claims in non-prescription drugs.
To deal with these problems the federal government enacted:
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The Meat Inspection Act (1906), mandating government enforcement
of sanitary and health standards in meatpacking plants;
The Pure Food and Drug Act (1906), prohibiting false advertising and
harmful additives in food
Progressives often portrayed their battles as simply the latest example of
an older struggle between "the people" and business interests and
proponents of democracy against the defenders of special privilege. In fact,
this view is quite misleading. Corporate managers were often strong
supporters of Progressive reform. During Theodore Roosevelt's presidency,
mining companies worked closely with the administration in order to try to
rationalize the extraction of natural resources. Big meatpackers promoted
the Meat Inspection Act of 1906 to prevent smaller packers from exporting
bad meat and closing foreign markets to all American meat products.
1920s Consumerism
By the end of the 1920s, Americans were overwhelmed by the rise of a modern consumer culture. In response, many of the bitter cultural tensions that had divided Americans had begun to subside. The growth of exciting new opportunities to buy cars, appliances, and stylish clothing made the country's cultural conflicts seem less significant. The collapse of the new economy at the decade's end would generate economic debates as intense as the cultural conflicts of the early and mid-­‐1920s. Americans in the 1920s were the first to wear ready-­‐made, exact-­‐size clothing. They were the first to play electric phonographs, to use electric vacuum cleaners, to listen to commercial radio broadcasts, and to drink fresh orange juice year round. In countless ways, large and small, American life was transformed during the 1920s, at least in urban areas. Cigarettes, cosmetics, and synthetic fabrics such as rayon became staples of American life. Newspaper gossip columns, illuminated billboards, and commercial airplane flights were novelties during the 1920s. The United States became a consumer society. The nation's first million-­‐dollar advertising campaign (Uneeda Biscuits in a waterproof box) demonstrated advertising's power. Before the 1920s, most advertisements consisted of vast expanses of print. Absent were brand names, pictures, or catch phrases. During the 1920s, advertising agencies hired psychologists (including John B. Watson, the founder of behaviorism, and Edward Bernays, Sigmund Freud's nephew) to design the first campaigns. They touted products by building-­‐up name brand identification, creating memorable slogans, manipulating endorsements by doctors or celebrities, and appealing to consumers' hunger for prestige and status. By 1929, American companies spent $3 billion annually to advertise their products-­‐-­‐five times more than the amount spent on advertising in 1914. Installment credit soared during the 1920s. Banks offered the country's first home mortgages. Manufacturers of everything-­‐-­‐from cars to irons-­‐-­‐allowed consumers to pay "on time." About 60 percent of all furniture and 75 percent of all radios were purchased on installment plans. In contrast to a Victorian society that had placed a high premium on thrift and saving, the new consumer society emphasized spending and borrowing. A fundamental shift took place in the American economy during the 1920s. The nation's families spent a declining proportion of their income on necessities (food, clothing, and utilities) and an increasing share on appliances, recreation, and a host of new consumer products. As a result, older industries, such as textiles, railroads, and steel, declined, while newer industries, such as appliances, automobiles, aviation, chemicals, entertainment, and processed foods, surged ahead rapidly. During the 1920s, the chain store movement revolutionized retailing. Chains of stores multiplied across the country, like Woolworth's, the five-­‐and-­‐dime chain. The largest grocery chain, A&P, had 17,500 stores by 1928. Alongside drugstore and cigar store chains, there were also interlocking networks of banks and utility companies. These banks and utilities played a critical role in promoting the financial speculation of the late 1920s, which would be one of the causes for the Great Depression. Layaway Plans
Layaway is a method of purchasing retail merchandise that enables shoppers to put an item on
reserve and make payments on it until it is paid in full. Merchants invented layaway during the Great
Depression, a time when many shoppers had little money available to make full purchases. In 2011,
layaway plans became popular once again as a way for struggling retailers to entice more customers
to shop. Wal-Mart decided to re-instate the layaway plan in late 2011. But do layaway plans benefit
customers or are they just another way for companies to boost their bottom lines? The answer may lie
in the middle, as layaways can be beneficial for both parties.
The Benefits of Layaway
Layaway enables shoppers to make a purchase even if they don't have the full amount of money
needed to pay for the items they want. By putting down a small deposit, the item is held for a period of
time, which varies from retailer to retailer, although 60 days is a fairly common period. Many retailers
extend that period during peak holiday shopping season, providing an opportunity to make sure the
most popular holiday gifts will be ready and waiting months down the road when they are needed.
Once an item has been put on layaway, the buyer makes regular periodic payments, taking the item
home only after it has been paid for in full. Unlike credit cards, layaway programs neither
charge interest, nor do they require a good credit score in order to participate.
The Downside
While layaway plans are convenient and affordable, they are not always free. Many stores charge a
nominal fee when items are put on layaway, and may charge a fee if the buyer misses a payment or
fails to pay off the merchandise. Some stores let buyers make the payments with a credit card - which
isn't in always in the buyer's best interest, particularly if a layaway fee also applies. The credit card
interest and the layaway fee will make the item significantly more expensive than if the item were just
paid for in full upon purchase.
Layaway programs also come with some limitations and challenges. Certain items, such as
computers, food and liquids may not be available through layaway plans. In addition, the store
offering the layaway plan could go bankrupt, leaving plan participants in a difficult position if they
cannot afford to pay off their purchases immediately.
Shopping Malls
A half-­‐century ago, architect Victor Gruen introduced America to the enclosed shopping mall. Before Gruen, there were two types of major shopping environments in the United States: the traditional downtowns, and the improvised shopping strips that lined highways of metropolitan areas. And although today's lifestyle centers and other Main Street-­‐inspired developments don't look anything like Gruen's creations, they don't necessarily break from Gruen's way of looking at the world. Throughout the 1950s, Gruen spelled out his philosophy: As people left the cities for the suburbs of postwar America, what they missed was a central place for shopping, walking, meeting neighbors or just spending time. Highway strip malls were uninspired, dangerous and single-­‐use. In designing the automobile-­‐based environment, then, architects should restore some of the satisfactions of the old pedestrian city, with new climate control technologies, within the safe walls of a mall. “The shopping center is one of the few new building types created in our times,” Gruen observed in his 1964 book, The Heart of Our Cities. Gruen recognized that a mall could solve the problems of both retailers and of planners by moving the shopping environment away from the highway and forming an integral part of a new residential community. He credited Kansas City's Country Club Plaza with pioneering this new way of shopping. No mere theorist, Victor Gruen Associates — among the postwar period's premier national architectural, planning and engineering firms — designed one of the first regional shopping centers, the Northland Shopping Center in Detroit, in 1954. It also conceived the first enclosed mall, Southdale Shopping Center near Minneapolis in 1956, and planned the first enclosed mall built in a central business district, Midtown Plaza in Rochester, N.Y., which opened in 1962. Gruen succeeded at reconciling the needs of the auto-­‐oriented suburban boom while creating a satisfying pedestrian friendly environment — if not in suburban communities, at least within the mall. His designs for shopping centers were profitable for their developers and focal points in their communities. While his ‘Mid-­‐Century Modern’ designs looked to the future, he was providing “the needed place and opportunity for participation in modern community life that…American town squares provided in the past.” Gruen also sought a balance between the architectural rigor of Modernism and the pragmatic realities of a competitive retail environment. Comparing it to the balance between federal and state governments, he wrote, “The overall character of the center must be one of corporate strength through the strength of individuals.” The statement is more prescient than perhaps Gruen imagined. On the other hand, his view of the future from the mid-­‐20th century was not flawless. In 1960, for example, he concluded that if the postwar economic boom and technological innovation were projected forward, Americans would soon create an affluent society with plenty of leisure time. Clearly, America remains affluent, but it has not delivered the leisure in abundance that Gruen and other futurists predicted. His prediction that all shopping would be done in “planned, coordinated shopping centers” has not come true. Internet and Consumerism
Shopping is nothing like it once was. It was only a couple decades ago when the salesman was calling all the shots. Armed
with the Internet, consumers are now better able to make informed decisions on the quality of products they buy before even
heading out to the store. It only takes a few clicks to acquire an overwhelming amount of useful information.
The web is crawling with testimonies, reviews, and other sources where the item you want may be found for a more reasonable
price, creating a competition in the sales realm that is more fierce than ever. Most recently, the advent of smartphone
applications allow users to even do comparison shopping right from their mobile device. Might I say, unbelievable?
Given these new standards, manufactures are forced to up the ante on the quality of what they produce. Sub-par products can
no longer get away with being mediocre. If General Electric produces a refridgerator with faulty capacitors, everyone is going
to know about it. “Word of mouth” has taken on an entirely new meaning. Consumers no longer have to rely on friends or
family for purchasing advice, they can simply rely on the experience of thousands who have already purchased the same or
similar product. As The Economist puts it, “…the consumer is finally seizing power” (“Leaders” 2005).
Many of us don’t know what we’d do without the Internet. We not only depend on the Internet for useful information,
communication, and entertainment but outsource e-commerce websites as an alternative to window shopping before heading out
to the store. Despite the Internet’s advantageous placeholder on marketing, most consumers aren’t willing to make online
purchases and wait for their item to be shipped. Instead, many consumers find the right product for the right price and
determine where the product can be purchased locally.
Electronic storefronts have attempted to squander this dilemma by offering free shipping on minimum purchase orders. This
not only gives the buyer incentive to buy from the online retailer because the shipping is free but also because the prices online
are often, in my experience, 10-20% cheaper than what you might find in stores. If do your shopping ahead of time, there are
some serious discounts to take advantage of.
Due to this major shift in sales, advertising has also had to make some serious changes. For instance, consumers are no longer
convinced by a salesman or television commercial that a product is worthwhile. Besides, if consumers are doing their prepurchase research online, who is to say that consumers will even take notice to a billboard or television commercial anymore?
To counter this, marketing and advertising firms have taken a liking to the virtual world of pop-up Internet browser ads and
hidden clips of video that the user is sometimes required to watch before they can access the desired online material. This may
seem unethical because advertisers are now in some fashion forcing people to view their ads whereas before one had the option
of looking away; but quite frankly, manufacturers are desperate to get the attention of consumers and are willing to do whatever
it takes.
There is money to be made in the online sector of sales and, if done properly, won’t be a hinderance to the economy but a
significant boost in revenue.
Black Friday
Black Friday is an ingrained part of our collective shopping culture, and as such, there is a great deal
of hype surrounding limited quantity doorbusters, which can offer up to 80% off retail prices. Shoppers
can only get these special deals at the very beginning of the sales, right when the doors open.
Moreover, major retailers create a sense of urgency by offering special deals to draw the crowds into
stores even after doorbusters have sold out.
Some of these additional methods that stores employ to create urgency include:
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Advertising ridiculously low prices on certain items
Offering special sales for limited hours during the day
Limiting the number of items available for purchase at the special price
Offering additional loss leaders, merchandise priced lower than actual cost
Retailers design these methods to encourage consumers who hope to find once-in-a-lifetime deals to
flock to the stores. The stores hope that shoppers will stick around and buy full-priced items in
addition to pillaging their discounted merchandise.
Some stores open at midnight on Thanksgiving night, while others open between 2AM and
5AM. Black Friday campinghas become popular as shoppers line up for doorbusters up to a day in
advance of stores opening.
Lastly, with the advent of the Internet, stores have begun to release their flyers online as a way to
further create excitement and urgency well in advance of Black Friday. Fortunately, these prereleases of doorbuster and sale information has also allowed enthusiastic consumers to determine
the best deals and carefully plan shopping routes before the big day arrives.
The Consequences of Black Friday
Unfortunately, Black Friday has also come to represent the consumer excesses of our society
and addiction to consumer electronics. News reports on the day after Thanksgiving feature hordes of
crazed shoppers, desperate for deals. While in the vast majority of stores volatile behavior is usually
limited to shoving and rude comments, there have been more serious incidents reported, including
trampling deaths.
In 2008, the first death attributed to Black Friday fanaticism was recorded at a Walmart in Valley
Stream, New York. Stampeding shoppers trampled an employee to death. Consumers refused to stop
their rush when store employees tried to help their coworker, ultimately contributing to the man’s
demise. Shoppers also buffeted the police officers who arrived to help.
The incident illustrates how ugly ordinary people can become when frenzied by consumerism and
materialism. Shoppers who do not exercise caution could find themselves in danger. Reports of fist
fights, stabbings, and gun threats have all occurred at stores on the retail holiday. Safe shopping on
Black Friday is important – be sure to exercise caution.