When Daniel Burnham, one of Chicago’s most famed architects, designed what is now Macy’s on State Street, he made good on his mantra: “Make no little plans; they have no magic to stir men’s blood….”
The stately structure not only spans an entire city block, but with its 10 floors of selling space accounting for 1.8 million square feet, the building is the second-largest department store in the world—second only to the Macy’s Herald Square flagship in New York. As a result, the store not only attracts its fair share of shoppers but also architectural aficionados, with regular tours given by the Chicago architectural foundation. The group is quick to highlight Burnham’s neoclassical details, the building’s century-old signature clocks and the
ceiling crafted by Louis Comfort Tiffany.
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“It’s truly a treasure, no matter who has owned us,” says Andrea Schwartz, who handles external and public relations for Macy’s East. It’s no wonder, then, that the State Street location, dating back to 1852—actually predating R.H. Macy’s first store—has become a beloved landmark for city dwellers, suburbanites and tourists alike who knew it to be Marshall Field’s for most of its life. Now responsibility for it, and perhaps challenge, belongs to Macy’s.
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Many Chicagoans who considered the store to be their own didn’t take well to the Macy’s name change, calling for a boycott and staging protests during the initial turnover in September 2006, and then again a year later. Macy’s, in turn, has worked hard to make local inroads, reaching out to and supporting the local fashion community by housing the Chicago fashion incubator, a home for select emerging designers to work and learn from buyers, and also by highlighting local apparel and accessories designers as part of the retailer’s Chicago-based designers collection. In July, Macy’s selected the work of 23 designers to be sold at State Street beginning in October.
The company also has moved manpower to the Windy City, centralizing about 40 jobs in the upper levels of the State Street store, in an effort to further create a local connection to the store and to other former Midwest Marshall Field’s sites as part of the “My Macy’s” marketing program.
“With all the controversy here, we wanted to bring the hub of operations back to Chicago,” says Mike Dervos, senior vice president and regional director of stores at Macy’s East. “We’re looking at how we get back to the local feel.”
Macy’s executives, for example, found that about 45 percent of the community in Ann Arbor, Mich., attends or works for the University of Michigan. Not surprisingly, executives also discovered that items, be they scarves, sweaters or hats, in the school’s colors of maize and blue sold better than any other colors, including black and white. Now Macy’s makes sure its store in Ann Arbor stocks pieces in the school-related hues throughout the first floor, Dervos says.
At State Street, Macy’s pinpointed two key customers, college students and professionals who work in Chicago’s Loop. In turn, that store aims to appeal to the hundreds of college students who attend a handful of nearby universities, hosts events with Time Out Chicago magazine and offers more contemporary denim brands—such as Seven For All Mankind, Joe’s Jeans, Citizens of Humanity, Rock & Republic, True Religion, Ed Hardy and Hudson—than other Macy’s locations.
The landmark space also hosts popular women’s suit events in which customers receive a boxed lunch and discounts including free alterations with suit purchases over a specific amount.
Macy’s on State Street also plans later this year to remodel the men’s personal furnishing department to make more room for its men’s collection and new soft shops, including one for men’s sportswear by Tommy Hilfiger.
In the meantime, the evolving store continues to maintain its storied history, including that of its couture 28 Shop, crafted by “Gone With the Wind” set designer Joseph Platt, who created 28 different dressing rooms that once enticed Yves Saint Laurent and Christian Dior to make their first trips to the U.S.; the history of its Frango mints (more than 1 million pounds are produced each year), some of which are now updated with organic ingredients and placed in recycled paper boxes, and that of its holiday window displays and 45-foot Great Tree positioned in the Walnut Room, where lines of mothers and daughters wait to dine, admire the tree and celebrate the holidays.
And now, perhaps, shoppers can enjoy a new tradition—that of visiting toy retailer FAO Schwarz, a shop-within-a-shop concept launched in November at Macy’s on State Street that is being rolled out to other Macy’s locations. According to Linda Piepho, vice president and general manager of Macy’s on State Street, “Now people love to get their picture taken with the soldier.”