Before the proliferation of national department stores, every large city had one or two dominant stores local to the area. Chicago had Marshall Fields, Dallas had Neiman-Marcus, Cincinnati had Lazarus, and Washington had Woodward & Lothrop. Philadelphia had two of them: Wanamakers and Strawbridge & Clothier. Philly also had Gimbels and Lits. Gimbels was a chain, but Lits was a single store. Both were on the down trend but neither had been gobbled up by one of the hungry “giants” that were beginning to take over the rest of the country.
Both of Philadelphia’s quality stores were customer friendly and were very community-minded. There was one major difference, however. John Wanamaker, founder, was long dead and no one in his family stayed with the store.
Wanamaker, himself, was frequently quoted as saying, “I know that half of my advertising is useless. I just don’t know which half.” It’s questionable whether this quote is correctly attributed to Wanamaker. Once, when I was in London, I had the pleasure of meeting with the top brass of the prestigious store, Harrods. They claimed that that statement was made by the founder of Harrods. Who knows or cares – the statement seemed to be accurate regardless.
At Strawbridge & Clothier , the “major difference” was the Strawbridge family which was deeply involved. Several of them were in top management including Stockton Strawbridge, who performed the role of chairman and CEO,and was an icon in the Philadelphia area.
He and his fellow Strawbridges were able to make wise decisions quickly. They had the skill and the authority to hire excellent people, to train smartly, and to enable career growth sensitivity. Clearly, excellence was their goal and they frequently achieved it. I’ll give you an example of how they did business.
We bought a bath mat at Strawbridges. Fairly quickly, it showed a lot of wear and tear. It seemed to be low quality so I took it back. The woman at the returns desk was pleasant and asked if I had the receipt. I didn’t but told her it was charged on their credit card. She checked quickly, accepted the bath mat and issued full credit. I thanked her and began to leave the area. Here’s the conversation that took place:
Woman: Sir, are you going to buy another bath mat?
Me: Yes. Why do you ask?
Woman: Well, if you do buy one, I suggest that you not buy one with a rubber backing.
Me: Why not?
Woman: The one you returned has a rubber backing and was surely ruined in a dryer.
Me: (Amazed) Are you telling me that you just now gave me credit knowing that we had likely ruined the mat ourselves?
Woman: That’s correct.
Me: Why in the world would you do that?
Woman: (Proudly) Sir, this is Strawbridge & Clothier!
The person responsible for her attitude was Stockton Strawbridge. He honored the history and reputation of his enterprise. He was beloved both within and outside the store. He enabled the first enclosed mall shopping center east of the Mississippi – Cherry Hill Mall. He supported community activities including the general upgrading of Market Street in Philadelphia. He was respected by political leaders, business leaders, and even his competitors.
Although I had met him several times and attended meetings where he had presided, I never really had a one to one discussion with him. For some reason that I can’t recall, that changed one Friday afternoon. There I sat, across the desk from Stockton Strawbridge, a heroic figure in my mind.
I don’t remember the purpose of the meeting but I do remember chatting for a few minutes and finding that he was a really nice guy. Imagine that.
While we were talking, he attended to a very large pile of papers stacked on his desk directly against the wall. It was about 12 inches high. He took about 3 inches worth of papers from the bottom of the stack and put them in his wastebasket.
Then he said, “I think I should explain what I just did. Everyday when papers and mail appear on my desk, I take care of everything that seems important and make sure it gets done immediately. Everything else goes on top of this pile. Every Friday afternoon, I remove enough papers from the bottom of the pile so that the pile isn’t above this pencil mark on the wall.”
He showed me the pencil mark and then added, “The amazing thing is that nothing bad has ever happened as a result of this little trick.” I learned later that Stockton Strawbridge loved little tricks and practical jokes.
I’ve tried to follow his guidelines. It’s not easy. However, I’ve thrown away a lot of papers and seldom (if ever) regretted it. Mr. Strawbridge taught me an important lesson about keeping your priorities straight. In today’s world, it has become too easy to become victim to information overload. Advertising agency project management software can help sort through unnecessary data and get to the core of what will make your project successful. I suspect that Strawbridge & Clothier believed in a similar way of doing business – and that most successful companies agree.
Allan Kalish is co-founder and Chairman of Workzone, LLC, a provider of web-based project management software and collaboration tools for ad agencies, marketing departments and any organization needing to manage projects more effectively.
