A building for the retail sale of goods.
Until the late 19th century, shop development
had been almost static but with the growth of
manufactured goods and the concentration of
population in big towns came the development
of the department store and the chain store.
The world's first department store was the
Bon Marche in Paris 1852. Macy's opened in
the USA 1858, Whiteleys in the UK 1863, and
Wertheim in Germany 1870. The main innovation
was goods at set prices. The chain stores
took the form of many shops scattered in
different towns or counties, able to buy
wholesale in such quantities that prices
could be lowered below those of smaller
competitors. As a development of wholesale
purchase came direct links with factories
producing goods, often under the same
ownership, which further cut costs, and even
the elimination of the shop itself by direct
mail or mail order. Self-service had been
originated in the USA many years earlier by
Clarence Saunders. It developed rapidly after
World War II as a result of staff shortages
and labour costs, and was introduced in
supermarkets for groceries and in
hypermarkets outside towns. In the USA in the
1970s there developed the `controlled
shopping environment' of an air-conditioned
enclosed mall of up to 250 shops in carpeted
arcades, often on several levels, with music,
free parking, cinemas, restaurants, and
childcare facilities, for example, Woodfield
Mall, Chicago. The idea was adopted in the UK
and elsewhere. Trading stamps, originating in
Britain about 1851, were developed in the USA
and re-exported to the UK (Green Shield) in
1958, but became a casualty of the recession
and changed shopping habits in the late
1970s. They were reintroduced in 1987.
Gradually being introduced are direct debit
from a customer's bank account by use of a
plastic card inserted in a computer terminal
at the point of sale (an example of EFTPOS),
and laser check-outs, which automatically
`read' a bar code on the packaging of the
goods and deliver an itemized bill to the
customer, as well as recording for the store
the deduction of the item from shelf stock.