The Jewel of Knightsbridge: The Origins of the Harrods Empire by Robin Harrod
Author:Robin Harrod [Harrod, Robin]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Non-Fiction, Biography, History, Commerce, Business, United Kingdom
ISBN: 9780750981941
Publisher: The History Press
Published: 2017-01-31T13:00:00+00:00
Having started his revolution with selling volume cheaply, as success continued Charles Digby tried to encourage more wealthy people to visit his store and provided a personalised service for important customers. They found him ‘so handsome, so honest and so obliging’ that he soon built up a fine reputation for himself in the neighbourhood. He abolished ‘cook’s perks’, the traditional prerequisite for servants who bought their masters’ provisions at the store. He managed to increase trade by introducing his own-brand groceries, patriotically packaged in the colours of the Union Jack (this may have been copied since!). He attracted custom by delivering all goods free of charge. His decision not to employ barkers to attract custom, preferring to circulate lists of the produce on offer to local houses, led to the production of lists like the 1870 Grocery Book. His merchandising skills would not be out of place today.
By the late 1870s, the continued success of the business prompted a further move for the family to the leafy suburbs, and by the end of that decade the store boasted more than 100 employees. Considerable rebuilding followed and further departments were added. By 1883 the number of employees had risen to over 150, and there were numerous separate departments. According to the Chelsea Herald, Harrod’s business, ‘which at one time was a purely local one, is now worldwide, and his clients – or customers – rank from the “Peer to the peasant”’.
On 8 January 1880, Charles Digby used the first full-column advertisement in the Times to publicise the shop and the goods on offer. It consisted of dozens of mini adverts taking up the whole of the last column. Charles Digby was keen on detail. In the June 1923 edition of the Harrodian Gazette, the retirement of a Mr Clancy was recorded after forty-two years of service. He had started working there in 1881. After a presentation, he replied with:
… much emotion, said how sorry he was to go. Through the generosity of the Company, he was retiring on a very good pension. He spoke of the happy times he had had whilst at the Stores. He said, ‘I entered the business in 1881. In those days, the Stores consisted of Grocery, Provisions, Ironmongery, Turnery, China and Patent Medicines. There was only one entrance, where the Perfumery door is now. The Office lay at the end of the long Grocery shop. Here worked the Governor, one Mail Order Clerk and one Porters’ Cash Clerk. One Country Ledger was kept, one Town and one To Pay Ledger. The Governor kept the Bought Ledger himself. Hours were from 8.30 a.m. to 9 p.m …
The Country Orders were copied into a quarto sized book with pen. Any Country Orders with addresses of which the Governor was not conversant were made ‘pro forma’ (in those days it was called ‘Label’, because a label was stuck on the bill asking for payment).
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