Misplaced Pages

#660339

26-680: Witmark was a catalog showroom and jewelry / electronics chain that operated in West Michigan from 1969 to 1997. The chain was founded by Paul Leven. Over its nearly 30-year history, Witmark dominated the jewelry market with an average of a 34% market share. The organization made it a point to develop and keep close ties with the communities the stores served. By the early 1990s, Witmark's earnings began to decrease due to continued involvement in unprofitable categories outside of jewelry. Big box stores such as Best Buy , Circuit City , Toys "R" Us , Dick's Sporting Goods , and MC Sports captured

52-470: A clothing catalogue called Argos Additions , however they sold the brand to Shop Direct Group in 2004. In 2021, Argos ceased production of its printed catalogue, but an electronic catalogue can be browsed in-store as well as online. Catalog merchants in the United States have declined since 1980, in favor of chain discounters, big box stores, and internet shopping. Prominent among catalog merchants during

78-559: A few key benefits to this approach. By operating as an in-store catalog sales center, it could be exempt from the " Resale price maintenance " policy of the manufacturers, which can force conventional retailers to charge a minimum sales price to prevent price-cutting competition; it also reduces the risk of merchandise theft, known in the industry as shrinkage . From the consumer's point of view, there are potential advantages and disadvantages. The catalog showroom approach allows customers to shop without having to carry their purchases throughout

104-424: A high street competitor to Argos and Kays , which unlike Argos and Littlewoods/Index had no shops and sold only by postal orders. Littlewoods, Kays and existing Grattan built their businesses around offering credit, however in the 21st century most High Street shops now offer store cards (a means of credit specific to the retailer) meaning these catalogues have lost some of their market niche. Littlewoods also ran

130-406: A landmark complex of 37 buildings, covering 37 acres of floor space under one roof. The building had a network of underground passageways and covered bridges. The warehouse space alone at 129-133 N. Second Street (a building which no longer exists) was eight stories tall. The company became one of the nation's largest wholesale enterprises with nationally known quality brands, among which Blue Grass

156-593: A newspaper which incorrectly announced that Belknap Hardware was bankrupt. The company was also known as W. B. Belknap from 1840 to 1860, W. B. Belknap & Co. from 1860 to 1880, W. B. Belknap and Co. Inc. from 1880 to 1907, and Belknap Hardware & Mfg. Co. from 1907 to 1986. On July 23, 1968, the Louisville Courier-Journal carried the Associated Press , Dow Jones , and other special dispatches' news that Belknap Hardware and Manufacturing Company

182-428: A number of outsiders, men who weren't also company officers . . . . The new board saw an opportunity to appoint someone from outside as president. Up to that time, Belknap promoted top officers from within, and virtually all the men in top management had begun their careers on the road, carrying a catalog." The closing of Belknap has been called a tragedy of errors. As early as 1909, the hardware company management sued

208-573: A result, this retail sector went into decline in the 1980s. As big box stores and internet shopping became increasingly popular in the 1990s, the decline of the catalog merchant business accelerated. Many companies in recent years have moved away from relying solely on catalog sales, augmenting them with online sales or direct retail. The move toward online sales includes long-established department store chains such as Sears and JCPenney that relied heavily on catalog sales. However, many long-established catalog merchants have gone out of business since

234-551: A smaller catalogue that did not offer credit called Index . Unlike goods from the Littlewoods Catalogue, which were purchased via postal order, Index goods could be purchased at Index branches and some branches of the Littlewoods department stores. Unlike Littlewoods, Kays and Grattan, who focused mainly on Clothing, Argos (and formerly Index) focus primarily on furniture, electronics and white goods. In 2001, Argos started

260-520: The National Historic Register since 1979, until 1955 was the tallest building in Kentucky. It was completed in 1928 and named for William R. Heyburn, a former president of Belknap Hardware and Manufacturing Company. This skyscraper's height was surpassed as the result of an addition to the top of the now defunct Commonwealth Building , which was imploded in 1994. A former home of members of

286-491: The 1980s, including Best Products , Brendle's , Ellman's , Jafco , KeyMid , Montgomery Ward , Rink's , Aldens , H. J. Wilson Co. , Service Merchandise , Sterling Jewelry & Distributing Company and Consumers Distributing . The Houston Jewelry & Distributing Company division of Sterling Jewelry & Distributing Company was successfully reconfigured as a full service fine jewelry and gift store in 1993 and has been in operation ever since. Houston Jewelry remains

SECTION 10

#1732887199661

312-419: The 19th and 20th centuries were Belknap Hardware and Manufacturing Company and Sears, Roebuck & Company . The repeal of the resale price maintenance sanctioning law in 1980 meant that chain discounters such as Wal-Mart and KMart could set and change prices at will, in a more consumer-friendly environment where the customer can examine the goods and confirm availability before approaching sales staff. As

338-632: The Belknap Hardware and Manufacturing Company. Morris Burke Belknap (1856–1910), also known as Morris B. Belknap or Col. Morris Belknap, was a vice president of Belknap Hardware. and was married to Lily Buckner., the daughter of Simon Bolivar Buckner . Belknap Hardware's fame spread and the company was represented at the 8th Annual Convention of the Panhandle Hardware and Implement Association in Amarillo, Texas. The Belknaps figured prominently in

364-561: The Spring and Summer Catalogue, the Fall and Winter General Catalogue, and the popular Christmas WishBook catalogue. In fall 2012, Sears Canada catalogue issued its 60th anniversary WishBook edition. In the United Kingdom , the sole national general goods catalogue merchant left in the high street market is Argos . Former catalogue retailers include Littlewoods , which owned the 'Index' brand as

390-528: The United States, and closed in 1996. Competitors in the Montreal area included Cardinal Distributors (launched by Steinberg but sold to Consumers Distributing in 1979) and Unique (folded in the 1970s). Shop-Rite , which operated 65 stores in Ontario, closed its doors in 1982. Sears Canada Inc still issues over 15 printed catalogues every year. Included in these (15) printed catalogues are three (3) large catalogues -

416-688: The elder (1811–1884) was born in Brimfield, Massachusetts , the son of Morris Burke Belknap the elder (1780–1877) and Phoebe Locke Thompson Belknap (1788–1873) and is not to be confused with William Burke Belknap the younger (1885–1965) or William Burke Belknap Jr. The elder William Burke Belknap started the company on the banks of the Ohio River in 1840. His father Morris Burke Belknap the elder had earlier developed iron foundries and other related businesses in Massachusetts which influenced his son's founding of

442-482: The electronics, toy , and sports markets respectively and more effectively than Witmark could. In 1996, Witmark experienced its fourth consecutive year of declining sales and earnings, and the company announced changes to its operating strategy. Unfortunately, vast barriers—such as long-term leases on real estate—limited the company's ability to adapt to the changing business climate. The following year, Witmark liquidated its assets and laid off its 700+ employees. Like

468-641: The history of the Pendennis Club of Louisville, the first club house of which, in 1848, was a former Belknap family mansion. After 50 years, Belknap Hardware was acclaimed in the Atlanta Constitution as one of the South's great industries. The company was praised in newspaper advertising by Southern Bell Telephone and Telegraph Company as an exemplary business user of the long distance telephone . By its 100th anniversary in 1940, Belknap Hardware had grown to

494-408: The larger national chains of catalog showrooms (such as Best Products ), the retail concept collapsed in the late 1990s due to overwhelming competition from big box stores and Internet shopping . Catalog showroom The catalog merchant has generally lower prices than other retailers and lower overhead expenses due to the smaller size of store and lack of large showroom space. There are

520-761: The only former catalog showroom to successfully return to a traditional jewelry format. Belknap Hardware and Manufacturing Company The Belknap Hardware and Manufacturing Company , also known as the Belknap Hardware Company or simply Belknap Hardware , was at one time a leading American manufacturer of hardware goods and a major wholesale competitor of retail sales companies Sears, Roebuck, and Company and Montgomery Ward . Located in Louisville, Kentucky , Belknap excelled both in catalog sales and widespread distribution of its own name-brand manufactured products. The company's founder William Burke Belknap

546-461: The store as they shop. Possible downsides include that customers may be required to give their contact information when an order is placed, take the time to fill out order forms, and wait a period of time for their order to be available for purchase. This wait may be days long, one of the chief vulnerabilities of the catalog showroom approach. Consumers Distributing operated over 400 stores in Canada and

SECTION 20

#1732887199661

572-637: The time it was "the largest single-unit hardware plant in the world. . . .". For a while the building was the location of the Presbyterian denomination's National Headquarters and is now known as the Waterside Building and is occupied by the Humana Corporation . Photographs of the actual demolition by explosion of a defunct Belknap building were used as promotional preview advertising for the 1993 film, Demolition Man . The Heyburn Building , on

598-494: The vast warehouse spaces grew larger and larger, and the Belknap neon sign could be seen from miles away. The company was founded by Belknaps and managed predominantly by members of the Belknap family and their chosen successors until its demise in 1986 when, after over 140 years, it faced bankruptcy and was sold. Terrence Gallaher, editor-in-chief of Hardware Age said, "In the late '70's, Belknap's Board of Directors came to include

624-513: Was changing its name to simply "Belknap, Inc." The company had not yet gone out of business, but the stockholders the day before approved the change of the name, reasoning that since no abbreviations of firm names were permitted under the new U.S. Fair Packaging and Labeling Act, the full name of the company would be hard to inscribe on small tools. The company's proxy statement explained that Belknap had not "conducted any manufacturing operation for many years," and that it carried much merchandise that

650-556: Was not hardware. Although not a manufacturer at that time, Belknap was still distributing items made for it "by other manufacturers under at least nine Belknap trade names." In 1923, the Belknap Hardware and Manufacturing Building was built at 101-23 East Main Street in Louisville's General Business District on the site of the second Galt House . It was designed by the architectural firm of Graham, Anderson, Probst, and White of Chicago and at

676-696: Was the most readily recognizable. John Primble knives, developed by an employee of the company, became a Belknap brand with its own division, made in Louisville between 1947 and 1985 by the John Primble Belknap Hardware Co. The Crusader manufacturing brand of Belknap included contractors' shovels, hammers, hatchets, axes, drawing knives, carpenters' pincers, planes, screw drivers, hand drills, wrecking bars, bit braces, auger bits, chisels, pliers, wrenches, tin snips, and tin ceilings. Other popular Belknap manufactured products included rifles, guns, padlocks, lawn mowers, and bicycles. Belknap inventory in

#660339