Top 10 Forgotten Department Stores (Part 2).

A continuation of 10 Department Stores that were lost in time. Over time stores go through a series of growth and decline from the competition of other stores and a retail shift to e-commerce. Be sure to leave a comment below on stores that were left out or think should be added to a future video.

Part 1 of this video can be found at (https://youtu.be/6bWqBUKgIpk)
Part 3 of this video can be found at(https://youtu.be/PaPXhxWtc7s)

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(Important Links & Sources)

Narrator: Sekoyya Little

Script & Production

Rasheed Stevens (Sheednomics)
Ketan (Sensible Chhora)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mnztn…​

🎥 Official Video Script Is Below Starting at Number #5🔻

#5 Wieboldt’s:

Wieboldt’s was founded in the year 1883 as a Chicago general retailer store. It was later renamed Wieboldt Stores, Inc. If I could say one unique trait of Wieboldt’s, it would be the S&H Green Stamps. Anyone remembers getting S&H stamps with every purchase that was made? It was one of the many reasons, people in my neighborhood loved going over to Wieboldt’s. They had a total of fifteen department stores at its peak and they mostly focused on great value for money merchandise that you couldn’t get anywhere else. This is what made them so popular back in the day. They were the best for any working-class family who couldn’t afford merchandise from the fancy stores in the mall, but nothing good ever lasts forever. During the 1980s, the market was changing to a new era and Wieboldt became unprofitable and went bankrupt in the year 1987.

#4 J.B. White:
J.B. White mostly operated in the Southeastern part of the United States. It was a department store chain founded by an Irish immigrant, James Brice White in Augusta, Georgia in 1874. The store initially started with furniture, electronic appliances, community programs, and a clothing line but later expanded to become a complete department store having all the necessary items. The store had quite the success initially but later profits started to drop and in the year 1910, H.B. Calvin Company bought the chain of stores. Then it was sold again to Mercantile Stores which also purchased Gayfer’s and a couple of others. After a couple of years, even Mercantile stores became a thing of the past and it was sold again to Dillard’s in the year 1998. Some of them were rebranded to Dillard’s to join the Dillard’s family of stores while some of them were rebranded as Belk.

#3 Goody’s:
Goody’s was another department store that primarily focused on the clothing line. It was M. D. Good friend who founded the store in Athens, Tennessee in the year 1953 but later they headquartered in Houston, Texas. Their focus on the clothing line included trending apparel, accessories, footwear, housewares, and cosmetics. At their best, they operated nearly 500 stores all over the United States. So, you might be wondering how come such a big franchise go down in the history like that? Well, sales and profits started to go down in 2005. Later they closed a couple of shops and had a total of just 69 stores before filing for bankruptcy in the year 2008. It was then sold to Stage Stores who then later filed for bankruptcy on March 10, 2020, after the lockdown that was initiated due to the current Pandemic.

#2 J.J. Newberry’s:
J.J. Newberry was established in the year 1911 by Josiah Newberry and it was one of the top American Five and Dime stores of that period. It was headquartered in Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania. While it started as a Five and Dime store, it quickly adopted the variety business model. By 1918, they had a total of 7 stores. Then they later went on an acquiring spree and bought a bunch of other stores. It was reported that when J.J. New berry died in the year 1954, while the franchise had a total of 475 stores. By 1961, they grew over a total of 565 stores. The franchise quickly felt the heat from the competition and fell down hard.

#1 Zellers:
Zellers was a Canadian Department store based in Brampton, Ontario. It was founded by Walter P. Zeller in 1931 and was acquired by Hudson’s Bay Company in 1978. The owner made a couple of acquisitions and became one of the largest franchises in the late 1990s with over 350 stores. This was their peak point before they started going down. In 2011 U.S. retail chain Target purchased the leases of up to 220 Zeller stores and began converting them to the Target nameplate as Target Canada. Some locations were resold to Walmart Canada. The 64 Zellers that remained were not in good areas since Target picked out the most profitable ones. In 2013, They were forced to close by parent company HBC and kept 3 open as liquidation centers since Target didn’t purchase the Zellers chain. As of January 2020, the last remaining locations closed.

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