Macy's drops efforts to placate Field's die-hards
Nov. 08, 2007
(AP) — Somewhere between sliding sales and regular protests outside their downtown Chicago store, Macy's Inc. executives realized they had a problem.
Two years after the company bought May Co. for $11 billion and started replacing homegrown department stores with the Macy's brand, anger from stubborn Chicago shoppers over the loss of the iconic Marshall Field's chain refuses to subside.
Macy's executives have struggled in other cities to reel in customers who miss local department store favorites — including Kaufmann's and Filene's. But nowhere has the task proved more difficult than Chicago.
"There are a lot of people who just can't get over the Marshall Field's name change," said Frank Guzzetta, the former president of Marshall Field's who now is chairman and CEO of Macy's North, one of seven regional divisions. "Those people, no matter how hard we worked at it, have continued to be detractors."
That's why this holiday season, Macy's has all but given up wooing the Field's faithful.
Instead, executives are mounting a full-fledged campaign to bring in new shoppers — especially those who lack a deep-rooted Field's connection — to its flagship State Street store.
The changes include a wine bar in the store's Walnut Room — hallowed ground for generations of Chicagoans who make meals served by tuxedo-clad waiters part of a holiday tradition. There's also free Wi-Fi, the city's only FAO Schwarz toy store and college nights featuring denim fitting clinics — designed to target children, college students and young professionals flocking to new downtown condos.
Ok, if I ever need a clinic to figure out how to wear blue jeans, I hope one of you has the guts to step up and have me humanely destroyed.
The efforts all are flanked by a new advertising campaign, dubbed "Take Me To State Street."
Oh that is catchy... put that on a pillow...
"You have to, at some point, stop and say, 'I apologize. I'm sorry you feel that way' and move on," Guzzetta said.
A classic non-apology apology, as in, I'm sorry you misunderstand me, I'm sorry you're an idiot, I'm sorry my brilliance confuses you, I'm sorry you're so easily offended by the asinine things I say and do, etc.
Critics aren't making the transition any easier.
There were more protesters at an anniversary rally outside the store this fall than there were during the initial switch in September 2006, organizers said.
"We're not acquiescing," said Jim McKay, the founder of the anti-Macy's group Field's Fans Chicago, which organizes protests. "It's part of our civic identity, it's part of our history."
Chicago, which gave birth to the mail-order movement led by Montgomery Ward and Sears, Roebuck & Co. during the late 1800s, began its love affair with the dry-goods store that eventually became Marshall Field's in 1865.
Over the decades, the retailer built its reputation on customer service (the company purportedly once sent all its elevator operators to charm school), eventually becoming as synonymous to the city as the Bears and deep dish pizza. Yeah, speaking of things that suck...
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6 comments:
Look, cold and calculating corporate executives who have denim fitting nights for college kids need to be sent to Iraq for charm school.
Or maybe we could just shoot them?
Everything is so disgusting in this culture. It's like a microwave fish fry.
To play devil's advocate:
1) I think it's safe to say Field was a pluocratic @sshole. He died (in New York!) after contracting pneumonia while playing golf.
2) Told the wives of the Haymarket Riot defendants to go phokk dereselves.
3) These people need to get a phokking life already:
http://fieldsfanschicago.org/
Try protesting, i don't know, THE WAR.
4) The Walnut Room is getting a wine bar.
Regarding Smiff's point no. 1: Field was a humongous, titanic, pluto @sshole. I tried to add a tag that said "we like our heartless bastard plutocrats to be LOCAL," but there wasn't room. He SUCKED. But those mints... mmmmmmmm...
Also, if I had known he died playing golf, I would have tried to add the "golf/plutocracy nexus" tag.
Rebecca brought in some Frango mints just last week. So they're available somewhere - maybe just in America's Finest City?
Chicago, NYC got one over you. Again. Gett ova it.
All those phokks need to get together, start a new store that sells all the crap they used to buy at Fields, and see whether it'll stay afloat. Has it really been two years and these guys still haven't gotten over it?
My mum was at the flagship store this afternoon. Only did two floors, way too big. Didn't buy anything. If that helps.
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