London Shopping Selfridges Department Store
Celebrating its Centenary in 2009 - Largest Shop on Oxford Street
Sep 12, 2009
Staff were hired months before the store opened and were trained in selling the innovative Selfridge way and his clever marketing was the secret of his success. He believed shopping should be fun, rather than a chore. Goods were displayed so customers could touch them and take time to examine them closely. Much more satisfactory than having over-eager assistants hovering over people all the time.
History of Selfridges Department Store
Gordon Selfridge was born in 1858 in Ripon, Wisconsin, USA. After a very successful career working for the Marshall Field Company and an equally successful marriage into a wealthy family, he amassed a huge fortune which allowed him to build his fabulous London store - something completely unique in that it had no previous life of starting out as a small shop. Right from day one it was designed as a department store. And what a department store! It wasn’t only Londoners that came - when the word got around there were customers from France, Germany, USA and many other countries.
Selfridges - Something Really Different
A born entrepreneur, Selfridge came up with some of the most interesting and crowd-pleasing ideas ever seen - certainly in a department store. Because his mantra was that shopping should be fun, and at the same time he wanted his customers to stay as long as possible in the store, he introduced such enticements as a library and a ‘silence room’ where customers could relax in peace and quiet. There were excellent restaurants with reasonable prices .
He was the first to come up with the concept of a beauty hall - something we take for granted today, but a hundred years ago nobody else had thought of it. He also drew customers in with scientific and educational exhibits such as the Milne-Shaw seismograph which was launched in 1913, and went on to become the world's standard earthquake recording instrument. It is now in the British Museum.
He also organised the first public demonstration of television by John Logie Baird, inventor of the world's first working television system. There were many more fantastic exhibitions, including the first aircraft to cross the English Channel in 1909, Louis Blériot's monoplane
Selfridges Clock
“Meet you under Selfridges Clock”. This is a favourite meeting place for visitors and Londoners alike. It is easily reached from most parts of the city and the canopy is a good place to shelter should it rain. (But it won’t, of course!) Above the Art-Deco main entrance there is a statue of the Queen of Time riding in her Ship of Commerce. It was created by British artist Gilbert Bayes
Selfridges Window Displays
Selfridges is world famous for its innovative window displays They are the best in London, and probably the most photographed. They have been called the Rolls Royce of window display culture.
Selfridges - The End of an Era
The Second World War years were a tough time for the store. In 1947 Gordon Selfridge died aged 90. He had had a lavish lifestyle and ended his days with only £1,500 to his name - around US$2,500.
The store changed hands a few times over the years and new branches were created in Birmingham and Manchester. In 2003, the chain was acquired by Canadian Galen Weston for £598 million. Weston is the owner of Canada's major supermarket chain, Loblaws.
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