Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-ndw9j Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-09T16:24:22.660Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Origins of American International Retailing: Tiffany of New York in London and Paris, 1837–1914

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 June 2017

Nicholas Alexander  and
Anne Marie Doherty
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This article considers the international retailing activities of Tiffany of New York between 1837 and 1914. Using data from the company archive alongside other sources, the findings indicate that five factors were determinants of sustainable international retailing: a centralized organizational structure, a stable ownership structure, existing international engagement, a strong brand identity, and a relevant international retail format. Placing Tiffany's activities in its wider commercial and consumer context, the findings illustrate the organizational changes and asset combination required to support the development of early international retail operations. The article contributes to theoretical understanding of the dynamics of retail internationalization.

Type
Research Article
Information
Business History Review , Volume 91 , Issue 2 , Summer 2017 , pp. 301 - 328
Copyright
Copyright © The President and Fellows of Harvard College 2017 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 Jones, Geoffrey, Multinationals and Global Capitalism: From the Nineteenth to the Twenty-First Century (Oxford, 2005)Google Scholar.

2 Hollander, Stanley C., Multinational Retailing (East Lansing, Mich., 1970)Google Scholar.

3 Kacker, Madhav P., Transatlantic Trends in Retailing: Takeovers and Flow of Know-How (Westport, Conn., 1985)Google Scholar.

4 Wilkins, Mira, The Emergence of Multinational Enterprise (Cambridge, Mass., 1970), 43–44 Google Scholar; Godley, Andrew, “Foreign Direct Investment in British Manufacturing,” Business History Review 73, no. 3 (1999): 394–429 Google Scholar.

5 The Graphic (London, England), 1 Dec. 1900, 824.

6 Resseguie, Harry E., “Alexander Turney Stewart and the Development of the Department Store, 1823–1876,” Business History Review 39, no. 3 (1965): 301–22Google Scholar; Twyman, Robert W., The History of Marshall Field and Company, 1852–1906 (Philadelphia, Pa., 1954)Google Scholar; Gibbons, Herbert, John Wanamaker, 2 vols. (New York, 1926)Google Scholar.

7 Resseguie, Harry E., “The Decline and Fall of the Commercial Empire of A. T. Stewart,” Business History Review 36, no. 3 (1962): 256n3Google Scholar.

8 Twyman, History of Marshall Field, 99.

9 Resseguie, “Alexander Turney Stewart”; Twyman, History of Marshall Field; Gibbons, John Wanamaker.

10 Alexander, Nicholas, International Retailing (Oxford, 1997)Google Scholar.

11 Dawson, John, “Internationalization of Retailing Operations,” Journal of Marketing Management 10, no. 4 (1994): 267–82Google Scholar.

12 Alexander, Nicholas, “British Overseas Retailing, 1900–60: International Firm Characteristics, Market Selections and Entry Modes,” Business History 53 (2011): 530–56Google Scholar.

13 Godley, Andrew, “Selling the Sewing Machine around the World: Singer's International Marketing Strategies, 1850–1920,” Enterprise & Society 7, no. 2 (2006)Google Scholar; Wilkins, Emergence of Multinational Enterprise.

14 Alexander, “British Overseas Retailing,” 552.

15 Doherty, Anne Marie and Alexander, Nicholas, “Liberty in Paris: International Retailing, 1889–1932,” Business History 57, no. 4 (2015): 485–511 Google Scholar.

16 Godley, Andrew, “Foreign Multinationals and Innovation in British Retailing, 1850–1962,” Business History 45, no. 1 (2003): 80–100 Google Scholar.

17 Vida, Irena, Reardon, James, and Fairhurst, Ann, “Determinants of International Retail Involvement: The Case of Large U.S. Retail Chains,” Journal of International Marketing 8, no. 4 (2000): 37–60 Google Scholar.

18 Eriksson, Kent, Johanson, Jan, Majkgard, Andres, and Sharma, D. Deo, “Experiential Knowledge and Cost in the Internationalization Process,” Journal of International Business Studies 28, no. 2 (1997): 337–60Google Scholar.

19 Kacker, Transatlantic Trends.

20 Alexander, International Retailing.

21 McGoldrick, Peter and Davies, Gary, International Retailing: Trends and Strategies (London, 1995)Google Scholar.

22 Alexander, Nicholas and Myers, Hayley, “The Retail Internationalisation Process,” International Marketing Review 17, no. 4–5 (2000): 334–53Google Scholar.

23 Dunning, John, International Production and the Multinational Enterprise (London, 1981)Google Scholar; Dunning, John, “The Eclectic Paradigm of International Production: A Restatement and Some Possible Extensions,” Journal of International Business Studies 19, no. 1 (1988): 1–31 Google Scholar.

24 Dunning, “Eclectic Paradigm of International Production.”

25 Vida, Irena and Fairhurst, Ann, “International Expansion of Retail Firms: A Theoretical Approach for Future Investigations,” Journal of Retail and Consumer Services 5, no. 3 (1998): 143–51Google Scholar.

26 Godley, Andrew and Hang, Haiming, “Globalisation and the Evolution of International Retailing: A Comment on Alexander's ‘British Overseas Retailing, 1900–1960,’” Business History 54, no. 4 (2012): 529–41Google Scholar.

27 Ferry, John William, The History of the Department Store (New York, 1960), 244, 305, 312Google Scholar; Gibbons, John Wanamaker; Hower, Ralph M., History of Macy's of New York, 1858–1919 (Cambridge, Mass., 1943)Google Scholar; Lancaster, Bill, The Department Store: A Social History (London, 1995), 86 Google Scholar; Miller, Michael B., The Bon Marché: Bourgeois Culture and the Department Store, 1869–1920 (Princeton, N.J., 1981), 119 Google Scholar; Pasdermadjian, Hrant, The Department Store, Its Origins, Evolution and Economics (London, 1954)Google Scholar; Resseguie, “Alexander Turney Stewart”; Resseguie, “Decline and Fall”; Twyman, History of Marshall Field, 175.

28 Zola, Émile, The Ladies' Paradise (1883; Oxford, 1995)Google Scholar.

29 Chandler, Alfred D. Jr., “The Emergence of Managerial Capitalism,” Business History Review 58, no. 4 (1984): 474 Google Scholar.

30 Lamoreaux, Naomi R., “Constructing Firms: Partnership and Alternative Contractual Arrangements in Early Nineteenth-Century American Business,” Business and Economic History 24, no. 2 (1995): 43–71 Google Scholar; Hilt, Eric and O'Banion, Katherine, “The Limited Partnership in New York, 1822–1858: Partnerships without Kinship,” Journal of Economic History 69, no. 3 (2009): 615–45Google Scholar.

31 Ferry, History of the Department Store.

32 Resseguie, “Alexander Turney Stewart”; Resseguie, “Decline and Fall.”

33 Twyman, History of Marshall Field.

34 Ferry, History of the Department Store, 61, 133.

35 Nichols, John P., Skyline Queen and the Merchant Prince: The Woolworth Story (New York, 1973), 65 Google Scholar.

36 Ibid., 66.

37 Wilkins, Mira, “The Neglected Intangible Asset: The Influence of the Trade Mark on the Rise of the Modern Corporation,” Business History 34, no. 1 (1992): 66 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

38 de la Cruz-Fernández, Paula, “Multinationals and Gender: Singer Sewing Machine and Marketing in Mexico, 1890–1930,” Business History Review 89, no. 3 (2015): 531–49Google Scholar; Godley, “Selling the Sewing Machine.”

39 Hower, History of Macy's, 158.

40 According to Bill Lancaster, it was not until the 1920s that they developed strong product-based single-brand identities. Lancaster, The Department Store, 88.

41 Ibid.

42 As early as 1852, during the time he ran a dry goods store at Haverhill and before he moved to New York, Rowland Macy advertised that “English, French and American” dry goods were available in his store. Hower, History of Macy's, plate between pages 20 and 21.

43 Resseguie, “Alexander Turney Stewart.”

44 Twyman, History of Marshall Field, 27, 99.

45 Miller, Bon Marché, 190.

46 Casson, Mark and Lee, John S., “The Origin and Development of Markets: A Business History Perspective,” Business History Review 85, no. 1 (2011): 19 Google Scholar; Lancaster, The Department Store, 86.

47 Woolworth store managers selected merchandise from an approved list provided by the firm's central buying operation. Nichols, Skyline Queen, 38.

48 Chandler, Alfred D. Jr., The Visible Hand: The Managerial Revolution in American Business (Cambridge, 1977), 234 Google Scholar.

49 Ibid., 233.

50 The firm had a store in Geneva for a short time in the 1870s. It was associated with Tiffany's watch factory and did not survive the closure of the factory.

51 A brief 1890s account of Tiffany's early history provides early commentary on the firm's development: Heydt, George Frederic, Charles L. Tiffany and the House of Tiffany & Co. (New York, 1893)Google Scholar. This source confirmed the firm as a suitable subject. Similarly, material such as Katherine Purcell's commentary in a Tiffany exhibition catalog of 2006 further supported the choice of this firm: Purcell, “Tiffany and Paris 1850–1910,” in Bejewelled by Tiffany 1837–1987, ed. Phillips, Clare (New Haven, 2006), 26–45 Google Scholar.

52 After the Franco-Prussian war of 1870–1871, rue du Cardinal Fesch was renamed rue de Châteaudun.

53 Charles L. Tiffany died in February 1902; for his obituary, see New York Times, 19 Feb. 1902, 9D.

54 Tiffany Catalogue, 1845, Tiffany Archive, Parsippany, N.J. (hereafter, TA).

55 Co-partnership agreements, Legal Department, Partnership Agreements, 1850–1864, TA; Incorporation document, 1868, TA.

56 John B. Young is described as Charles Tiffany's “neighbour, friend and schoolmate” in Heydt, Charles L. Tiffany, 9.

57 New-York Tribune, 19 Feb. 1902, 3A.

58 Ibid.

59 Ibid.

60 Partnership agreement, 15 Apr. 1850, TA; Partnership agreement, 1 May 1856, TA.

61 For a recent discussion of psychic distance in the retail business history literature, see Hang, Haiming and Godley, Andrew, “Revisiting the Psychic Distance Paradox: International Retailing in China in the Long Run (1840–2005),” Business History 51, no. 3 (2009): 383–400 Google Scholar.

62 Heydt, Charles L. Tiffany, 18.

63 Ibid.

64 Annuaire Général du Commerce, Paris, comp. Didot Frères, 15th ed. (1852), 398.

65 The advertisement encourages visitors to Paris to go to Tiffany, Reed and Company's store. Courrier des hôtels et Guide du commerce réunis, 12 Aug. 1863, 1.

66 Minute Book 1868–1908, 8 June 1868, 19, TA.

67 Ibid.

68 New York Daily Tribune, 9 Dec. 1868, 8E.

69 Almanach des 100,000 adresses des fabricants et commerçants, comp. Gambon, A. (Paris, 1873), 73 Google Scholar.

70 Resolution to accept Frodsham's agency, Minute Book 1868–1908, 9 Sept. 1869, 39, TA.

71 Belfast News-Letter, 4 Nov. 1870, 1A. He was resident at the Langham Hotel, in Langham Place, Marylebone, on April 2, 1871. Census of England and Wales, 1871, RG 10 158, Public Record Office, National Archives, Kew, London; Kelly's Directory (London, 1872)Google Scholar, commercial listing, 1308, street listing, 159.

72 Kelly's Directory (London, 1883)Google Scholar, commercial listing, 1311, street listing, 161.

73 Kelly's Directory (London, 1891)Google Scholar, commercial listing, 1400, street listing, 163; Kelly's Directory (London, 1892)Google Scholar, commercial listing, 1382, street listing, 592.

74 “Notes about Town,” The Watchmaker, Jeweller and Silversmith 17, 1 (July 1891): 9B Google Scholar.

75 Ibid.

76 Personnel Records: Engagements T. & Co, TA; Personnel Records: Engagements, box 1869–1906, TA; Engagements of Employees 1895, 88, TA.

77 Tiffany Catalogue, 1845, 3, TA.

78 Minute Book 1868–1908, 16 Apr. 1873, 71, TA.

79 Minute Book 1868–1908, 2 Oct. 1874, 58, TA.

80 Dated 15 April 1875, a document announcing this change survives in the company archive in French and English. Partnership Agreements file, TA.

81 Spaulding, H. A., My Trip to the Courts of Europe: Report Rendered to Mr. Charles Lewis Tiffany, President of Tiffany and Co. (New York, 1897)Google Scholar.

82 Tiffany Catalogue, 1879–80, 1878, 5, TA.

83 “Notes about Town,” 9B.

84 Surrounding properties did not see an increase in gross estimated rental value. This increase in rental value for 221/221A was not the result of a general revaluation for the area. Westminster Rate Book, St. George's, Conduit Ward, 1890, City of Westminster Archive Centre, London (hereafter, CWAC); Kelly's Directory (London, 1891)Google Scholar; Westminster Rate Book, St. George's, Conduit Ward, 1891, CWAC; Kelly's Directory (London, 1892)Google Scholar; Westminster Rate Book, St. George's, Conduit Ward, 1892, CWAC; Westminster Rate Book, St. George's, Conduit Ward, 1892, CWAC.

85 Heydt, Charles L. Tiffany, 27.

86 Regent Street photograph D135(25), CWAC.

87 London Register No. 3, Tiffany & Co, TA.

88 Pall Mall Gazette (London), 21 Dec. 1899, 11A.

89 Regent Street: 1898 C138(19, 21); 1910 D135(25), CWAC.

90 Letter dated 4 Oct. 1905 copied into minutes, Minute Book 1868–1908, 20 Nov. 1905, n.p., TA.

91 Le Matin (Paris), 12 Aug. 1884, 4B.

92 Letter dated 4 Oct. 1905, Minute Book 1868–1908, n.p, TA.

93 Ibid. Louis Comfort Tiffany was the son of Charles L. Tiffany, one of the two original partners. Here, Louis Comfort Tiffany recognizes the role of Parisian window display as a means to attract a new and wider consumer market. See Williams, Rosalind H., Dream Worlds: Mass Consumption in Late Nineteenth-Century France (Berkeley, Calif., 1982)Google Scholar.

94 Letter dated 4 Oct. 1905, Minute Book 1868–1908, n.p, TA.

95 These roles included sales personnel in the showroom, staff in the diamond office, repair and delivery staff, clerks, porters, and packers. Personnel Records: Engagements, box 1869–1906, TA; Engagements of Employees 1895, 88, TA.

96 Cable transcribed into minutes, Minute Book 1868–1908, 20 Nov. 1905, n.p., TA.

97 Minute Book 1868–1908, 20 Mar. 1906, n.p., TA.

98 Ibid.

99 Ibid.

100 Ibid.

101 La Construction Moderne (Paris), 21 Jan. 1911, 197; Daily Trade Record New York, 10 May 1910, 3; New York Herald (Paris ed.), 24 Apr. 1910, 1.

102 Daily Trade Record New York, 10 May 1910, 3.

103 New York Herald (Paris ed.), 24 Apr. 1910, 1.

104 Ibid.

105 Ibid.

106 Ibid.

107 Purcell, “Tiffany and Paris,” 26–45.

108 Montgomery, Maureen E., Gilded Prostitution: Status, Money and Transatlantic Marriages, 1870–1914 (London, 1989), 2 Google Scholar.

109 Pall Mall Gazette (London), 20 Nov. 1899, 9C.

110 London Register No. 3, Tiffany & Co., London, Sales, TA.

111 New York Herald (Paris ed.), 24 Apr. 1910, 1.

112 Maddison, Angus, The World Economy: Historical Statistics (Paris and New York, 2003), 58, 60Google Scholar.

113 Ibid., 58–61.

114 Resseguie, “Alexander Turney Stewart”; Resseguie, “Decline and Fall.”