Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to synthesize the papers written for this special issue, to suggest some themes and problems emerging from recent retail history, and to bring together work from a variety of subfields. Design/methodology/approach – The essay surveys recent themes in...

In an examination of the history of food distribution in the United States, Deutsch demonstrates the important roles that gender, business, class, and the state played in the evolution of American grocery stores. She argues that the supermarket, that icon of postwar American life, emerged not...

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explore and identify the causes of the failure of the Larkin Company (Buffalo, NY), once one of the nation's largest mail‐order houses in the decades surrounding 1900. Design/methodology/approach – Borrowing conceptual frameworks from both recent...

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine the origins and the business model of department stores in Mexico between 1891 and 1910. Design/methodology/approach – Primary and secondary source material support an historical and comparative study of retailing and marketing evolution in a...

Purpose – Focusing on the early development of the three major forms of local advertising employed by independent department stores across the USA – newspapers, radio, and television – this paper examines continuity in the industry's commercial use of new technologies....