Nothing says 'the birth of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ quite like his and hers bathtubs for $4000 (in 1966 - about $40,000 today). Neiman’s as never really considered a “Christmas” store. Hell…half the people who bemoan losing Christ from Christmas usually called them “Needless Markups”.
I worked for Neiman Marcus in the 1970’s and I knew Mr Stanley (Marcus) personally. He was fascinated by electronics and I happened to work in that department, and because of that, I was often over at his house setting up the latest and greatest electronic equipment. I was just a teenager when I worked there, and I left and went to a blue collar job of loading trucks at a dairy, but I still did my Christmas shopping at the downtown Neiman Marcus store. I was there one December coming out of the parking garage across the street from the store and Stanley Marcus was waiting at the crosswalk to cross the street. I walked up and he turned to me and smiled and said “Joe, it’s so good to see you, how have you been?” I was totally blown away - a man who was world famous greeted a punk teenager by name…and was SINCERE. I understood then why he was as successful as he was - he made me feel special…just as he did every customer at his store.
So dropping “Christmas” from the catalog is only a big deal in right wing Christian circles. And most of THEM never shopped there in the first place, so I’m not sure how a boycott would work.
A buddy of mine and I walked through the one in Atlanta.
He was scared to touch anything in there.
I am not sure if there is one in KC but St Louis has one.
Not really my place to shop. Most designer clothes are ugly and expensive.
Everything else is just overpriced.
I have an issue with clothes.
I blame it on my wife.
I hesitate to buy anything full price though, if I remember right I bought a Guess shirt from the clearance at Neimann when we were in Atlanta.
as in you buy to many?
Maybe so. But here was the thing about them, at least up until the dawn of the internet…Service. You weren’t a sales clerk in a retail store at Neiman’s. All sales associates had a clientele book and they DID check them. I made more sales from that book that I made from customers walking in the store. We had notes of their favorites, of past items they bought…things about them…and we called them and said “they just came out with xxx and I’m sure you would love it”. Most of the times they would buy it. They never had to go to a store…they never had to log on to a computer. WE called them. To make THEM feel special.
And Neiman’s sold more than designer stuff and the pricing was quite close to similar stuff at other department stores. Mr Stanley often stopped by the store on Saturdays and would visit with us. He was 70 when I met him and I was 18. And he treated me as a peer, not a kid. I’ve always been a fan of NM because of him.
For what it’s worth, the Neiman Marcus of today isn’t the same as they were in the past.
Ohhhh ya!!
A few years ago I decided to iron about 10 shirts that I hadn’t worn in a while.
I came into work and a co-worker asked me if it was new. I said, “no, back of the closet”.
She had been here 3 years and never saw the shirt.
Now we play a game “new or back of the closet”.
She also asked me to go home and count my shirts.
Just dress shirts and polos that I would wear to work, I did not count sweaters or sweatshirts, at that time, and it has grown since, was 75.
My wife’s rule is I am supposed to get rid of 2 for every one that I buy, but we don’t follow that.
Tee hee that rule would not work here as closet is not big enough. Wife’s rule here is if you ain’t used it in a year it is outta here.
Anyway back to N-M… Once upon a time I lived in Dallas and even got an N-M card. Would wander thru the store from time to time but I don’t recall that I ever bought anything. But it’s a shame for such a fine Jewish establishment to give up long tradition of Christmas catalog.
One could order Herrshner’s catalog it’s Christmas from front to back. Didn’t see any mention of Chanuka. Mazel Toff!
WHile they WERE a fine Jewish establishment back in the day, but they were that in name only after an LBO by two private equity firms in 2005. Then it was going to go public in 2013 but instead got bought by two other entities, then decided to go public again in 2015 and finally went into bankruptcy in 2020 and became part of 5 investment firms. Stanley Marcus died in 2002 and again, it hasn’t been a “fine Jewish business” since about that time. IT’s a corporation. So get upset if you want, but for the past 20 years it has been owned by equity investors. And those people are seeing that the stores are attracting a younger clientele. Look at church attendance for the younger people today and they don’t put as much weight on Christmas as older conservatives.
Make no mistake - they were an excellent company, but that company pretty much died when Mr Stanley died.,
We don’t have a Neiman Marcus near us but when my daughter lived in Chicago I went to the one in Chicago and when my mother-in-law was alive we use to go the Neiman Marcus in Boca Raton, FL. However, now that our daughter lives in Atlanta and my mother-in-law died years ago I haven’t been to a Neiman Marcus in years. I use to love to have lunch there because they had the most delicious popovers.
NM filed for bankruptcy in 2020. They came back from that and had to sell some things to do so. Earlier this year, they announced a merger with Saks 5th. Which remains dominant, we’ll see.
My mom use to call the stores Kneecapme Markup.
I thnk they have a store in Atlanta.