In case you are avoiding the crowds at the Black Friday sales, sit back and learn something about how this Christmas shopping madness got started. Everyone knows the name Macy's because of the Thanksgiving Day parade, and from the movie Miracle on 34th Street. In fact, Macy's invented the concept of the "Christmas shopping season" by staging the annual parade. But that is far from the only retail innovation Macy's brought us.
These innovations included fixed pricing, pay as you buy, pricing in non-round numbers, Christmas window displays, and having Santa Claus right there in the store. Innovative and relentless promotion caused Macy's flagship store to grow to two million feet! That was 100 years ago; it's back down to a million now. Macy's bought up stores outside of New York that benefited from the name, peaking at around 850 stores in 2018. Since then, Macy's has cut back due to the decline of malls, but the brand is still synonymous with the heyday of department store shopping. -via Laughing Squid