There's nowhere 'posh' now. Just expensive! Eg Harvey Nicks.
I was miserable in John Lewis's just before Christmas -a windowless, soulless maze. Very poor to no customer service at all. I think I object so much because I remember how things were in the past.DD loves John L and can't understand my dislike of it. Sigh.
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Nobody to call me Madam?
What's killing the traditional department store? Jane Tulloch shares her tale of the theatrical ambience and glitz of department stores in the late 1960s, and wonders what has happened to them.
"These shops did more than sell goods: they sold us on luxury and pleasure: they made us feel special."
Whatever happened to the good old fashioned department stores of yore? The ones where they called you madam and there were delicate little chairs at each counter for madam to perch on as she discussed her order with the attentive black-dressed assistant.
The ones where you could buy (and have delivered) anything from a pin to a grand piano with everything and anything else in between. Such department stores used to be found in every large town and city throughout the country. In Cardiff there was Howells, in Bradford Brown, Muff and Co, Manchester had Kendal Milne. London had several including Harrods of course, as well as Liberty’s, Whitely’s and Dickins and Jones.
A few, a brave few of these traditional department stores, do remain although almost as tourist attractions and tending to be owned by large overseas conglomerates rather than the families who used to own and run them.
I well remember the thrill of entering a large department store in Edinburgh: the door was swung wide for us by a uniformed commissionaire who touched his cap to my mother and gave every indication that she was known to him and her custom appreciated. She nodded regally. I was impressed. I was even more impressed when taken for a half term treat of lunch in the dining room of a large Glasgow department store. While we consumed our meal, beautiful models wandered coolly around the tables in a range of expensive outfits and elegantly displayed key features such as velvet lapels or fan pleated skirts for our awed pleasure. These shops did more than sell goods: they sold us on luxury and pleasure: they made us feel special.
We weren't allowed to sit down, forbidden to fold our arms and banned from saying “Can I help you?” to customers (too off-putting apparently.)
Often beautiful, these old shops were almost theatrical in ambience. It was only when I began to work in one as a summer job in the 1970s that I realised that there was very much a backstage and a front of house. I could see clearly that the assistants were performing a role for the public but also that they had stories of their own. Each department was a venue for a drama, each customer and staff member a potential audience or actor. Of course, this potential had already been spotted and used by the 1970s sitcom “Are you being served” but, with its focus purely on comedy, a great deal was overlooked.
We had such fun there despite what now seem incredibly outdated rules and regulations. We weren’t allowed to sit down, forbidden to fold our arms and banned from saying “Can I help you?” to customers (too off-putting apparently.) The senior sales assistants (but not us juniors) were on commission and earned a massive 1p in every £2.40! The January sales were a time to dread: just looking at the tidal wave of ladies intent on bargains rushing down the department towards us was terrifying. This was mitigated by the laughs we had: calling each other ridiculous names in front of customers without smiling, sabotaging tasteful displays, treasure hunts around departments, complicated April fools tricks, and other examples of youthful exuberance. I’m sure gransnetters have many similar tales as customers and staff.
Why did these lovely stores decline from the late 1960s to 70s? Was it because we were seduced away by the proliferation of “boutiques” for our trendy clothing? The explosion of very modern chain stores on our high streets? Were the old department stores too hopelessly difficult to update? Most likely a combination of all these in conjunction with the dire economic times prevailing.
I miss them now there is nowhere left to call me madam.
Jane's new book, Our Best Attention is published by Comely Back Publishing and is available from Amazon.
Post your comments below for a chance to win one of five copies of Our Best Attention.
By Jane Tulloch
Twitter: @JaneTulloch1
The Woollies further down the road was where I bought my first lipstick - Trinity Pink by Rimmel (pick and mix too 
). I think John Menzies was at the other end and that's where my Granny and Grandad took me to buy my Enid Blyton books. Happy days.
I think Drafferns always has the picture ad, on the hand written receipts from pads and the till receipts, but it was the till receipts that fascinated me as a child (I was 5 in 1965 
).
Charleygirl was that when M&S was in the Murraygate? I wouldn't mind living next door to one of their food halls either. 
grandma60 real live monkeys! Changed days indeed.
ad do you remember the long receipts you got in Drafferns? There was a picture of the store on every receipt (an artist's drawing) that made it much longer than a receipt from DM Brown or Cairds, etc. Rumour was that it was done to show Drafferns was a cut above all the other department stores. A great marketing strategy!
roses yes I remember Gamages - it was just down the road from where I worked. At the time I was 'saving up to get married' (do people still say this? 
) and I would spend my lunch times wandering around this lovely old store dreaming of all the things I wanted to buy for our first home.
When I started work at 17, in a solicitors' in Grays Inn Fields, I got a Christmas Bonus of £5. I went straight to the fabric department in Gamages and bought two pure wool dress lengths, two patterns, cottons, buttons and zips. All out of that £5! You wouldn't even get a pattern for that these days 
. I can still remember those two dresses I made - they were much admired!
I still have a few knives, forks and spoons left over from the first 'bottom drawer' item I ever bought - a cutlery set costing £2/10s in Gamages! I also have the large meat platter from a Poole Pottery dinner service I bought there.
I was so sorry when I heard it had closed down in the early '70s.
Galen after that first visit, do you think they would recognise the 'smart' you?
Just remembered a dreadful memory of shopping in McGills in Dundee with my Granny. I was probably about 10 years old and we were great pals. I loved going shopping with her because I was the first GC and spoilt rotten! There's a photo somewhere taken in Dundee city centre by a DC Thompson street photographer of us shopping when I was about 5 or 6 years old and it appeared in the evening paper. But this shopping adventure scarred me for life. She took me with her to a new corset fitting. .
I sat on the chair out side the fitting room as the fitting went on and I still remember the 'foundation garments' being carried in and out of the fitting room by the assistants. My eyes were probably huge because I'd never seen anything like that before. I remember that on this occasion, in addition to a 'normal' corset (not sure what that was tbh), she was trying on a pink rubber thing that went over the top of it and had to be rolled on. It was years before I twigged during a conversation with my Mum that it was actually called a roll on.
The other thing I remember is how expensive it was and couldn't believe something you wore could cost so much! I hadn't really got a clue how much clothes cost, but I knew you could get an awful lot of Enid Blyton books from Menzies for a cost of the that corset!
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