Macys Company Profile

Macys Facts

Macys is the name of a chain of American department stores including one in New York City that bills itself as “the world’s largest”. The company is also well-known for sponsoring Macys Thanksgiving Day Parade, an annual parade in New York City. Macy’s is part of Federated Department Stores.

Macys History

Macys was founded in 1851 by Rowland Hussey Macy as a dry goods store in downtown Haverhill, Massachusetts. In 1858, Macy moved to New York City and founded a new store named R.H. Macy & Company on the corner of 14th Street and 6th Avenue, which later moved to 18th Street and Broadway on the “Ladies’ Mile”, the 19th century elite shopping district, where it remained for nearly 40 years.

In 1896, Macys was acquired by Isidor Straus and his brother Nathan, who had previously sold merchandise in the store. In 1902 the flagship store moved slightly uptown to Herald Square at 34th Street and Broadway.

Although the store initially consisted of just one building, it expanded through new construction and merging, eventually occupying the entire block bounded by 7th Avenue on the west, Broadway on the east, 34th Street on the south and 35th Street on the north.

The only exception is one small brownstone on the corner of 34th and Broadway, which remains a separate property, though Macys rents it annually for a legendary sum, and always camouflages the facade with giant signs.

Macys claims to be the world’s largest department store, with 198,500 m² (2,150,000 ft²) of selling floor. (Although others claim that the GUM store in Moscow, Russia is larger.)

The same property problem presented itself when Macys built a store on Queens Boulevard in Jackson Heights, Queens, New York, This resulted in a architecturally unique round department store on 90% of the lot, with a small privately owned house on the corner. It was a case literally of the “little lady who wouldn’t sell”.

Macys Merger

On February 28, 2005, at a time when Macys had about 400 stores, Federated agreed to terms of a deal under which it would acquire May Department Stores for $11 billion in stock, creating the nation’s second largest department store chain with $30 billion in annual sales and over 1,000 stores.

On July 28, 2005, Federated announced that, based on the success of converting its own regional brands to the Macys name, it proposed to similarly convert 330 regional department stores owned by the May Company, named variously Famous-Barr, Filene’s, Foley’s, Hecht’s, The Jones Store, Kaufmann’s, L.S. Ayres, Meier & Frank, Robinsons-May, or Strawbridge’s, pending approval of the merger by federal regulators.

Where Macys stores were in close proximity to other May company stores, some redundant stores would close while others might be converted to Bloomingdale’s, another brand owned by Federated.

On September 20th, 2005, Federated announced that all of its Marshall Field’s stores would become Macys by the end of 2006, becoming the new Macys North division. The announcement was met with much negativity; the city of Chicago considers the change to be a slap in the face, and the people of the Midwest have lost yet another venerated and well-respected brand.

If completed as envisioned by the Fall of 2006, Macy’s would have approximately 730 stores in the United States. Lord & Taylor will remain a separate brand for now. Federated has announced that it will issue a decision about Lord & Taylor by the end of the 2005 fiscal year, i.e. the end of January, 2006.

Macys Trivia

Macys has entered the popular psyche of the United States in a number of ways:

The movie Miracle on 34th Street is set in Macys, and remains a holiday season staple on US television. Remakes of the movie are often (but not always) set in Macys.

The Macys Thanksgiving Day Parade, the most famous and most watched Santa Claus Parade, has been sponsored by Macys for over 75 years. Among New Yorkers it is often referred to as “The Macy Day Parade”. The first Macys parade was held in Haverhill in 1854, but was only attended by about 100 people.

The phrase “Does Macy’s tell Gimbel’s?” used in the USA as a put-off to inquiring people (the implication being that a company does not give information out to its competitors). Gimbel’s was the other large department store, directly across 34th Street from Macys. It has since folded.

Macys has also been sponsoring fireworks displays in New York for decades, usually on Independence Day.

The star in the Macys logo comes from a tattoo that Mr. Macy got as a boy.