You know, there must be some people who read this siteregularly and wonder – “Dave, you’re a blogger. Why don’t you ever take a standon anything? You never weigh in on the big issues of our time. You’re always onthe fence. Asleep at the wheel. Out to lunch. AWOL!”
Well, friends, I want you to know that I hear you, and todayI’m answering the call! And the issue I herewith weigh in on is one that is, orshould be, near and dear to our classic retail-loving hearts. It can be summedup in one phrase:
Bring back the San Fernando J.C. Penney.
When a national retail chain closes shop in a long-standinglocation, it’s typically news – in the local area, that is, and not far outsideit. But this summer, when J.C. Penney ended an 80-year tenure in San Fernando,California (the city of San Fernando, specifically, which lies within the SanFernando Valley, part of Greater L.A.), it set off a furor that popped in andout of national headlines for weeks.
On Saturday, July 28th, despite rallies in thelocal community, online petitions, celebrity pleas, tons of local news storiesand national coverage from the likes of the Huffington Post, the public radioshow Marketplace, Bloomberg Businessweek (Plain old “Business Week” was muchmore concise, right? But hey, it’s his magazine now!) among others, J.C. Penneyshuttered the San Fernando store, which had existed in its current locationsince February 1953.
Official comment from JCP on the matter has been terse,putting it charitably. “We would not have moved forward with this difficultdecision if we did not believe it was absolutely necessary for the futuregrowth of our company”, the company’s press response read.
Speculations behind the closing have been raised (and shotdown) from several angles, with some alleging the closing was part of an effortto trim costs in light of huge losses JCP has experienced this year as aconsequence of its controversial rebranding/repositioning efforts. Others contend the small store (60,000 squarefeet with just over half of that space devoted to selling, three floors, noescalators), long an anomaly for Penney, is a poor fit for the rebrandingconcept. Still others claim the San Fernando location itself has beenunprofitable for years.
It’s easy to understand why San Fernando residents are upsetabout losing their Penney store, an obvious point of pride for the community.The store has been an anchor for their downtown at a time when most big-nameretailers long ago abandoned downtown locations for the “wide open spaces” werefer to today as malls and shopping centers. Certainly it was handy – whilePenney has no shortage of huge stores in The Valley, it’s hard to beat “downthe block” for convenience, even though selections were limited compared tostandard Penney stores. There’s the longevity factor – the San Fernandolocation far outlasted the hundreds of downtown Penney stores built through thedecades up until the late 50’s. Indeed, had JCP opted to close it down in 1970or 1980, the uproar might never have materialized.
Lastly, the store’s timeless deco-influenced facades, frontand rear, remain a thing of beauty. Most late 1940’s/early 1950’s Penney storesacross the country were very plain in appearance, while the San Fernando unitexemplifies the extra effort that many national retailers poured into theirCalifornia locations. Just two years ago, the building’s owner, AshkenazyDevelopment, spent some $350,000, including the services of a historian, torestore the facades and the “Penney’s” blade sign, which reportedly hadn’tworked for nearly forty years.
The story took a nasty turn on the second night after thestore’s closing, when residents discovered sign crews (after dark, with the companyname on their truck covered up) pulling the “J.C. Penney Co.” lettering off theback of the building and one worker preparing to go after the neon blade signwith a torch, all in violation of an order to leave them alone pending ahistorical preservation hearing. The removed letters were reinstalled the nextday.
At this late date, it seems unlikely that J.C. Penney willreopen the store, but you have to admit it would be a great public relations gestureand would serve to counteract some of the negative publicity the company hasreceived in recent months. The “Save San Fernando’s JCPenney” site features acouple of interesting concepts for expansion, should JCP reverse theirdecision. At any rate, the store’s designation as a historic site appears to beassured. Rightfully so.
Our goal here, of course, is to depict great stores likethis in their heyday, and once again I thank the J.C. Penney Archives at theDeGolyer Library at Southern Methodist University for their invaluablecooperation in supplying these photos – festooned in Grand Opening glory, followedby an interior view, then front and rear facade views from after thefestivities cooled down.
As a postscript, here’s a sidenote from the “Basic DataSheet”, a centrally-maintained dossier of sorts, for this store, last updatedin 1971 and now part of the JCP archives. It’s interesting to note who Penney’s regarded as competition in thosedays -within a four-mile radius, there were department stores: Ohrbach’s, TheBroadway, Robinson’s, a small Sears “hard-lines” store, discounters White Front,Kmart, Gemco and Cal Stores (sister division of Baza’r stores). “Fantastic Fair”one of my ultra-faves, is also listed, but I’m pretty sure they were gone bythat time. (I’ll have to do a 10-part series on that one someday.)There were alsothe variety stores Grants and Newberrys, and apparel stores Scotts, the Melody Shopand Sally Dresses. The Penney’s unit outlasted them all.
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