158 Fun Facts About Shopping

Southdale Center, the first fully enclosed US shopping mall, opened in 1956 in a suburb of which metro area?

Southdale Center opened in October 1956 in Edina, Minnesota, a suburb of Minneapolis–Saint Paul, as the first fully enclosed, climate-controlled shopping mall in America.

Which Austrian-born architect designed Southdale Center and pioneered the enclosed regional mall in 1956?

Victor Gruen, born in Vienna in 1903, designed Southdale Center; he later disowned the suburban mall, decrying the 'land-wasting seas of parking' that surrounded his idea.

Which architect said Southdale had 'all the evils of the village street and none of its charm'?

The mall was loosely modeled on the covered arcades of crowded European cities, an inspiration Wright clearly did not admire.

Piggly Wiggly, opened by Clarence Saunders in 1916, is remembered as the first grocery store to do what?

Saunders patented the 'self-serving store' concept the following year, and later experimented with a fully automated shop called the Keedoozle.

In what year did Oklahoma grocer Sylvan Goldman introduce the shopping cart to his Humpty Dumpty stores?

Goldman rolled out the first carts at his Humpty Dumpty stores in Oklahoma City on 4 June 1937; shoppers shunned them until he hired people to push them around the aisles.

Sylvan Goldman built his first shopping cart prototype by adding a basket and wheels to what?

Goldman's prototype was a wooden folding chair with a basket on the seat and wheels on the legs; men thought the carts effeminate and women said they looked like baby carriages.

What was the first product ever scanned with a UPC barcode at a retail checkout, on 26 June 1974?

A 10-pack of Wrigley's Juicy Fruit gum was scanned at a Marsh supermarket in Troy, Ohio, ringing up 67 cents; the pack later went on display at the Smithsonian.

Who popularised 'Black Friday' for the day after Thanksgiving, describing the crowds and traffic?

Philadelphia police used 'Black Friday' in the early 1960s for the post-Thanksgiving crush of shoppers and traffic; the cheerier 'in the black' accounting story only spread in the 1980s.

Which organisation coined the term 'Cyber Monday' in a 2005 press release?

The National Retail Federation's Shop.org arm coined 'Cyber Monday' in a 28 November 2005 press release, noting workers back from Thanksgiving used fast office connections to buy what they had browsed.

Singles' Day, China's giant annual online shopping festival, falls on which date?

Singles' Day is 11 November, written 11/11 because the numeral 1 resembles a bare stick for unattached people; Alibaba turned the student holiday into a shopping festival in 2009.

Long before Alibaba turned it into a shopping bonanza in 2009, Singles' Day originated in 1993 where?

Singles' Day began in 1993 among male students in a Nanjing University dormitory as a joke holiday for bachelors, spreading to other campuses before Alibaba commercialised it in 2009.

What was Amazon's original 1994 name, dropped after a lawyer misheard it as 'cadaver'?

Jeff Bezos incorporated the company as Cadabra Inc. in July 1994; his lawyer misheard it as 'cadaver', and Bezos chose Amazon partly because a name starting with 'A' sat near the top of alphabetical lists.

The first book ever sold on Amazon.com was 'Fluid Concepts and Creative Analogies' by which author?

Douglas Hofstadter, the cognitive scientist behind 'Gödel, Escher, Bach', wrote the book Amazon sold to John Wainwright in April 1995; its subtitle was 'Computer Models of the Fundamental Mechanisms of Thought'.

When Amazon Prime launched in 2005, what was the flat annual fee for free two-day shipping?

Prime launched in February 2005 at $79 a year for unlimited two-day shipping; the fee rose to $99 in 2014 and to $119 in 2018.

What was the first item ever sold on eBay, back when it was still called AuctionWeb in 1995?

It fetched $14.83 from a buyer who assured Pierre Omidyar he collected broken laser pointers.

A PR manager invented the tale that eBay began so Omidyar's fiancée could trade which collectible?

PR manager Mary Lou Song concocted the 1997 tale that eBay was built so Pierre Omidyar's fiancée Pam could trade Pez dispensers; the myth hooked journalists and persisted for years.

The name 'eBay' is a shortening of what?

Omidyar wanted echobay.com, but a gold-mining company called Echo Bay Mines already owned the domain.

Walmart, Target and Kmart all opened their first stores in which year?

All three debuted in 1962: Kmart in suburban Detroit in March, Target in Roseville, Minnesota, in May, and Sam Walton's first Wal-Mart Discount City in Rogers, Arkansas, that July.

Walmart's home office is in which Arkansas city?

Walmart's home office is in Bentonville, Arkansas, where Sam Walton opened Walton's 5&10 on the town square in 1950; that original storefront became the Walmart Museum.

Before Walmart, Sam Walton ran a franchise of which variety-store chain in Newport, Arkansas?

Walton bought a Ben Franklin variety-store franchise in Newport in 1945 with a $20,000 loan from his father-in-law and $5,000 of Army savings, then lost the lease in 1950.

Costco set what price for its hot dog and soda combo in 1985?

The combo was priced at $1.50 in 1985 for a quarter-pound all-beef hot dog and a soda with free refills; co-founder Jim Sinegal famously told his successor he would kill him if he raised it.

Costco's house brand, Kirkland Signature, takes its name from what?

The brand launched in 1995, when the company was still based in Kirkland, Washington, before moving to Issaquah.

IKEA's I and K are Ingvar Kamprad's initials; what do the E and A stand for?

The E and A stand for Elmtaryd, the family farm, and Agunnaryd, the nearby village in Småland where Kamprad grew up; he registered the name in 1943.

How old was Ingvar Kamprad when he founded IKEA as a mail-order business in 1943?

Kamprad, born in March 1926, was 17 when he registered IKEA in July 1943 at his uncle Ernst's kitchen table; he only began selling home furnishings in 1948.

When Harrods unveiled England's first escalator in 1898, what were nervous customers offered at the top?

Harrods installed England's first escalator in November 1898; attendants at the top offered brandy and smelling salts to shoppers unnerved by the 'moving staircase'.

What did John Rendall and Ace Bourke buy from Harrods in 1969 and later release in Kenya?

The lion cub, named Christian, was bought from Harrods' pet department in 1969 and released in Kenya with George Adamson; footage of his 1971 reunion with the pair went viral decades later.

Which retail slogan is usually credited to Harry Gordon Selfridge or his old boss Marshall Field?

'The customer is always right' is attributed to Harry Gordon Selfridge, who had worked under Marshall Field before opening Selfridges on Oxford Street in 1909; Field himself is also sometimes credited.

What did John Logie Baird publicly demonstrate at Selfridges in 1925?

Baird showed moving silhouette images by television to Selfridges shoppers over three weeks from 25 March 1925; in 1909 the store had drawn 150,000 people in four days with Louis Blériot's Channel-crossing monoplane.

Émile Zola's novel 'Au Bonheur des Dames' was inspired by which pioneering Paris department store?

Le Bon Marché, run by Aristide Boucicaut from 1852, was the model for Zola's fictional store; its 1870s expansion on rue de Sèvres involved Gustave Eiffel's engineering firm.

On which Paris department store's roof did pilot Jules Védrines land a plane in 1919?

Védrines set his Caudron G.3 down on the Galeries Lafayette roof on 19 January 1919 to win a 25,000-franc prize; the store's Boulevard Haussmann dome dates from 1912.

Macy's red star logo comes from a tattoo R. H. Macy got while working as what?

Rowland Hussey Macy sailed on the Nantucket whaler Emily Morgan as a teenager and had a red star tattooed on his hand; the star replaced the store's rooster emblem in 1862.

With no central heating in its retail areas, what keeps Mall of America warm?

Mall of America, opened in 1992 in Bloomington, Minnesota, relies on its acres of skylights, store lighting and shoppers' body heat to keep the interior around 70°F through the winter.

Dubai Mall, opened in 2008 with more than 1,200 shops, stands adjacent to which landmark?

Dubai Mall sits at the foot of the Burj Khalifa in Downtown Dubai, beside the Dubai Fountain lake; it also holds an Olympic-sized ice rink and an aquarium of more than 300 species.

James Ritty patented the first cash register in 1879 because employees at his what were pocketing takings?

Ritty ran a saloon in Dayton, Ohio, and patented his 'Incorruptible Cashier' in 1879 to stop bartenders skimming; John H. Patterson bought the business in 1884 and renamed it National Cash Register.

James Ritty got the idea for the mechanism of his cash register from a device he saw counting what?

On an 1878 steamship voyage to Europe, Ritty watched a device counting the propeller's revolutions and adapted it to count sales; his machine's bell is why sales are 'rung up'.

Diners Club was born after Frank McNamara suffered what mishap at a New York restaurant in 1949?

He returned in February 1950 and paid with a cardboard charge card; the company was formally founded that same month with his lawyer Ralph Schneider.

During the 1960s, S&H Green Stamps boasted that it issued more stamps annually than which organisation?

In the 1960s S&H claimed to print three times as many stamps as the US Postal Service's forerunner, the Post Office; shoppers pasted them into saver booklets and swapped full ones for goods from a 35-million-copy catalog.

The earliest documented coupon, issued in 1888 for a free glass of its product, came from which company?

Asa Candler's Coca-Cola handed out tickets for a free glass from the late 1880s; by 1913 some 8.5 million had been redeemed, roughly one free drink for every nine Americans.

What was Sears selling by mail when Richard Sears met watch repairman Alvah Roebuck in the 1880s?

Richard Sears began selling watches by mail from a Minnesota railway station in 1886 and hired watch repairman Alvah Roebuck in 1887; their catalog later offered kit houses from 1908 to 1940.

How did F. W. Woolworth pay for the Woolworth Building, the world's tallest when it opened in 1913?

Woolworth paid the building's $13.5 million cost entirely in cash, with no mortgage; the 'Cathedral of Commerce' held the world-height record until 1930.

In 2001 the company once known as F. W. Woolworth renamed itself after which chain?

Woolworth Corporation became Venator Group in 1998 and renamed itself Foot Locker, Inc. in 2001 after its best-performing chain; Britain's separate Woolworths stores closed in January 2009.

What name did Amancio Ortega originally want for the chain that became Zara?

Ortega planned to call his 1975 A Coruña shop Zorba after 'Zorba the Greek', but a bar two blocks away already used the name, so he rearranged the letters he had bought for the sign.

Boxing Day, the 26 December holiday, takes its name from what?

The 26 December holiday usually coincides with the Christian feast of Saint Stephen.

Building of Istanbul's Grand Bazaar began in winter 1455-56, shortly after which event?

Mehmed II ordered the first bedesten built in the winter of 1455–56, two years after the Ottoman conquest of Constantinople in 1453; the bazaar grew to 61 covered streets and more than 4,000 shops.

Since 1979, Trader Joe's has been owned by the German family behind which discount grocery chain?

Theo Albrecht, Aldi's co-founder, bought the California chain twelve years after the first Trader Joe's opened in Pasadena.

Target's mascot Bullseye is a white dog of which breed?

Bullseye is a white Bull Terrier with the red Target logo painted around one eye; the character debuted in a 1999 'Sign of the Times' advertising campaign.

What was Kmart's 1965 promotion announced with 'Attention, Kmart shoppers' called?

The Blue Light Special, begun in 1965 at a Fort Wayne, Indiana, store, used a rotating blue police-style light to mark a short-lived markdown; Kmart retired it in 1991.

What do the letters in shopping channel QVC stand for?

QVC stands for Quality, Value, Convenience; Joseph Segel launched the channel from West Chester in November 1986, opening with a two-year exclusive deal to sell a major department-store chain's goods.

The word 'escalator' was originally a registered trademark of which company before it was genericised?

Charles Seeberger coined it in 1900 from Latin roots, and the Seeberger-Otis machine won first prize at that year's Paris Exposition.

John Wanamaker, credited with creating the price tag, later held which federal office?

Wanamaker served as Postmaster General under Benjamin Harrison from 1889 to 1893, introducing commemorative stamps; he also pioneered the money-back guarantee and fixed price tags at his Grand Depot store.

The first self-checkout machine was installed in July 1986 at which chain near Atlanta?

David R. Humble's CheckRobot installed the first self-checkout lanes at a Kroger store in Tucker, Georgia, in July 1986; shoppers scanned and bagged their own goods, then paid a central cashier.

Jack Ma named Alibaba after a character from which collection of tales?

Ma chose Ali Baba, the woodcutter of 'One Thousand and One Nights', because the name was recognised worldwide; he founded the company with a group of friends in his Hangzhou apartment in June 1999.

The phrase 'retail therapy' first appeared in print on Christmas Eve 1986 in which newspaper?

Chicago Tribune columnist Mary Schmich wrote on 24 December 1986 that Americans were 'nursing our psychic ills through retail therapy', the phrase's first recorded appearance in print.

What feature did Margaret E. Knight's 1871 machine give paper bags, letting them hold more?

Knight's 1871 patent folded and glued bags with flat bottoms so they stood open and held more; she won an interference suit against Charles Annan, who had copied her design.

The word 'mannequin' derives from a Flemish word meaning what?

'Mannequin' comes via French from the Flemish diminutive 'manneken', meaning little man, the same word behind Brussels' Manneken Pis statue; English adopted it for dressmakers' figures in the 1700s.

What nickname did critics give FDR's 1939 decision to move Thanksgiving a week earlier?

Critics dubbed the 1939 move 'Franksgiving'; Fred Lazarus Jr. of Federated Department Stores had lobbied for seven more shopping days, and Congress fixed Thanksgiving on the fourth Thursday of November in 1941.

Which 'adopted' soft-sculpture dolls sparked in-store riots among Christmas shoppers in 1983?

Coleco's Cabbage Patch Kids, each sold with 'adoption papers', caused stampedes in December 1983 and made the cover of Newsweek; creator Xavier Roberts had begun hand-stitching them as 'Little People' in 1978.

The plush toy that peaked in Christmas 1996, reselling for up to $1,500, was based on which Sesame Street character?

Tyco's Tickle Me Elmo giggled and shook when squeezed; one Denver buyer allegedly paid $7,100 and a radio auction fetched $18,500 for charity.

Which retailer published the Christmas 'Wish Book' catalog, first issued in 1933?

Sears issued its first Christmas Wish Book in 1933, a separate holiday catalog of toys and gifts headlined by Lionel electric trains; it ran until 2011 and was revived in print and online in 2017.

The Elf on the Shelf began as a 2005 book written by Carol Aebersold and whom?

Carol Aebersold wrote the book with her daughter Chanda Bell, who suggested turning the family's own Christmas tradition into a book; the elf flies to the North Pole nightly and returns to a new hiding spot.

The tongue-in-cheek price index published each December by PNC Wealth Management tracks the cost of what?

PNC's Christmas Price Index, published since 1984, totals the cost of the 364 gifts in 'The Twelve Days of Christmas'; the seven swans a-swimming are usually the single most expensive line.

What is the retail term for stores putting out holiday merchandise well before the shopping season?

'Christmas creep' was coined in the mid-1980s for the ever-earlier arrival of seasonal stock; by the 2010s some large US chains were shelving Christmas goods in early September.

Which company grew out of the Kansas City stationery store that sold French envelope liners as gift wrap in 1917?

Hallmark traces its gift wrap to 1917, when Joyce and Rollie Hall sold French envelope linings at 10 cents a sheet after running out of tissue; they sold out two Christmases running and began printing their own.

What do US retailers call the last Saturday before Christmas?

Super Saturday, also called Panic Saturday, is the last Saturday before Christmas, falling between 18 and 24 December; retailers run one-day sales to catch last-minute shoppers.

Which figure's arrival always ends the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, opening the Christmas shopping season?

Santa Claus's float closes the parade, as it did at the first one in 1924, when costumed store employees marched with animals borrowed from the Central Park Zoo.

A bank in which state introduced the first 'Christmas club' savings account in 1909?

Merkel Landis of the Carlisle Trust Company in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, launched the first Christmas club in 1909; members deposited small sums weekly and were paid out in time for holiday shopping.

Tesco was founded in 1919 by Jack Cohen in which part of London?

Cohen began in 1919 selling surplus groceries from a market stall in Well Street, Hackney; the Tesco name came in 1924 from tea supplier T. E. Stockwell's initials plus his own surname.

Sainsbury's was founded in 1869 with a shop on which London street?

John James and Mary Ann Sainsbury opened their first shop at 173 Drury Lane, Holborn, in 1869, selling butter, milk and eggs; Tesco overtook the chain as Britain's largest grocer in 1995.

Marks & Spencer was founded in 1884 in which English city?

Michael Marks opened his Penny Bazaar stall in Leeds' Kirkgate Market in 1884; Thomas Spencer became his partner in 1894, giving the firm its name.

In 1980, M&S became the first British supermarket chain to sell what?

M&S began selling packaged sandwiches in 1980, kick-starting Britain's chilled lunchtime sandwich market; in 1998 it also became the first British retailer to post a pre-tax profit above £1 billion.

John Lewis is owned by a trust for its employees, who are known as what?

John Lewis staff are called Partners because the John Lewis Partnership, created by Spedan Lewis through trust settlements in 1929 and 1950, is held in trust for them; Waitrose staff are Partners too.

The name of French retailer Carrefour means what in French?

The first shop opened in 1960 near a crossroads in suburban Annecy.

Karl and Theo Albrecht built their discount grocery empire from their mother's shop in which city?

The brothers took over their mother's grocery in the Schonnebeck district of Essen in 1946 and grew it to about 300 stores by 1960 before splitting the business into Nord and Süd divisions.

7-Eleven began in 1927 in Texas as what kind of business?

7-Eleven began in 1927 when a Southland Ice Company ice house in Texas started selling milk, bread and eggs alongside blocks of ice; company head Joe C. Thompson spread the idea to its other ice docks.

The 7-Eleven name, adopted in 1946, referred to what?

The chain is now owned by Japan's Seven & I Holdings.

Before becoming 7-Eleven, the chain went by what name from 1928 to 1946?

The stores were called Tote'm from 1928, because customers 'toted' away their purchases, and were marked by Alaskan totem poles; the name changed to 7-Eleven in 1946.

Best Buy was founded in 1966 under what name?

Richard Schulze opened Sound of Music, an audio specialty shop in Minnesota, in 1966; after a 1981 tornado wrecked a store, a 'best buy' clearance sale inspired the 1983 rebrand.

Which tech-support brand is a subsidiary of Best Buy?

Geek Squad, founded by Robert Stephens in 1994, was bought by Best Buy in 2002 and grew into its in-store and in-home tech-support arm, alongside subsidiaries Magnolia and Pacific Sales.

Amazon bought Whole Foods Market in 2017 for how much?

Amazon paid $13.7 billion, or $42 a share, for Whole Foods in a deal announced in June 2017 and completed that August; the grocer kept its headquarters in Austin.

John Mackey's 1978 vegetarian food store, forerunner of Whole Foods, was called what?

Mackey and Renee Lawson Hardy opened SaferWay in Austin in 1978, the name a spoof of the Safeway chain; it merged with Clarksville Natural Grocery to open the first Whole Foods in 1980.

Dollar General began in 1939 as a family business in which state?

J.L. Turner and Son began as a wholesaler in Scottsville, Kentucky, in 1939; the first store branded Dollar General opened in Springfield, Kentucky, in 1955, and the company adopted the name in 1968.

TJX's flagship off-price chain trades in Europe under what name?

TJ Maxx trades as TK Maxx in the UK, Ireland and continental Europe; the name was changed at its 1994 British launch to avoid confusion with the discount chain TJ Hughes.

TJX, parent of TJ Maxx and Marshalls, was formed in 1987 as a subsidiary of which chain?

It became Zayre's legal successor after a 1989 reorganisation.

Nordstrom, founded in Seattle in 1901, originally sold only what?

It did not start selling clothing until the 1960s.

James Cash Penney's first stores were part of which chain before he used his own name?

Penney opened his first store in Kemmerer, Wyoming, in 1902 as a partner in the Golden Rule chain of dry-goods stores; he incorporated under his own name in 1913.

Montgomery Ward, the mail-order pioneer that traded from 1872 to 2001, had what nickname?

Shoppers jokingly called Montgomery Ward 'Monkey Wards' for decades; Aaron Montgomery Ward's first 1872 catalog was a single sheet, and by 1883 it ran to 240 pages and 10,000 items.

Neiman Marcus was founded in 1907 in which city?

Herbert Marcus, his sister Carrie Marcus Neiman and her husband Al Neiman opened the store at Elm and Murphy Streets in Dallas on 10 September 1907.

Charles Lazarus's 1948 store, forerunner of Toys 'R' Us, initially sold what?

Lazarus opened Children's Bargain Town in Washington, DC, in 1948 selling baby furniture; customers kept asking for toys, and by 1957 he had refocused the business as a toy supermarket.

The dance-on piano at FAO Schwarz was made famous by which 1988 film?

In 'Big' (1988) Tom Hanks and Robert Loggia dance 'Heart and Soul' and 'Chopsticks' on the giant floor keyboard at FAO Schwarz's Fifth Avenue store.

Hamleys, the world's oldest toy shop, was founded in 1760 under what name?

William Hamley, from Cornwall, opened his shop as 'Noah's Ark' at 231 High Holborn in 1760; the business moved to Regent Street in 1881.

Gap Inc. was founded in 1969 by which couple?

Donald and Doris Fisher opened the first Gap on Ocean Avenue in San Francisco in August 1969, selling Levi's jeans and records; the name nodded to the 'generation gap'.

The name Uniqlo is a contraction of what?

Uniqlo contracts 'Unique Clothing Warehouse', the name of the first store Tadashi Yanai opened in Hiroshima in 1984; a 1988 registration slip in Hong Kong turned the 'C' into a 'Q'.

H&M began in 1947 as 'Hennes', a Swedish word meaning what?

'Hennes' is Swedish for 'hers', fitting a shop that sold only women's clothing when Erling Persson opened it in Västerås in 1947; menswear arrived in 1968, when the 'M' joined the name.

Which hunting and fishing retailer did Hennes buy in 1968, adding the 'M' to its name?

Hennes bought Mauritz Widforss, a Stockholm hunting and fishing outfitter, in 1968, taking on its menswear stock and adding the M to become Hennes & Mauritz.

Primark trades under what name in the Republic of Ireland?

A trademark clash with JCPenney kept the name out of other countries after 1976.

Sephora takes its name from the biblical Zipporah, the wife of whom?

Sephora's name comes from Zipporah (Séphora in French), the wife of Moses in the Book of Exodus; founder Dominique Mandonnaud built the chain from a perfumery in Limoges and pioneered self-service fragrance counters.

Which UK pharmacy chain did Walgreens fully acquire at the end of 2014?

The deal created the holding company Walgreens Boots Alliance.

CVS was founded in 1963 as an abbreviation of what?

CVS stood for Consumer Value Stores when brothers Stanley and Sidney Goldstein and Ralph Hoagland opened the first one in Lowell, Massachusetts, in 1963, selling health and beauty products.

RadioShack began in 1921 as a mail-order business serving which hobby?

Brothers Theodore and Milton Deutschmann founded Radio Shack in Boston in 1921 to supply amateur radio operators by mail; the 'shack' was the wooden hut that housed a ship's radio gear.

At its 2004 peak, roughly how many stores did Blockbuster operate?

David Cook founded it in 1985 as a single video rental shop.

Which Barnes & Noble rival was liquidated in 2011 after filing for bankruptcy?

Borders, founded in Ann Arbor in 1971, filed for bankruptcy in February 2011 and closed its last stores that September after no buyer emerged.

New York's Strand Bookstore is known for what slogan?

The Strand's '18 Miles of Books' slogan refers to its shelving; Ben Bass opened it on Fourth Avenue's Book Row in 1927 and it moved to Broadway and 12th Street in 1957.

Powell's City of Books, said to be the world's largest independent bookstore, is in which city?

Powell's City of Books fills a whole block in Portland, Oregon's Pearl District, about 68,000 square feet; Walter Powell opened the original Portland store in 1971.

On Etsy, items described as 'vintage' must be at least how many years old?

Etsy's rules define vintage as at least 20 years old, so listings must predate the sale by two decades; the site launched in 2005 for handmade goods, vintage items and craft supplies.

E-commerce platform Shopify is headquartered in which Canadian city?

Shopify grew out of Tobias Lütke's Ottawa snowboard shop, Snowdevil, in 2006; the company is headquartered in Ottawa, Ontario, and listed on the Toronto and New York exchanges in 2015.

Zappos launched in 1999 under what domain name?

Nick Swinmurn launched the company as Shoesite.com in 1999 and renamed it Zappos, from 'zapatos', Spanish for footwear, within months; Amazon bought it in 2009 for about $1.2 billion in stock.

Grocery delivery firm Instacart's legal corporate name is what?

Instacart's legal name is Maplebear Inc., the name on its September 2023 Nasdaq listing; Apoorva Mehta founded the company in San Francisco in 2012.

Chinese e-commerce giant JD.com was formerly known by what name?

JD.com used the 360buy name and domain until a 2013 rebrand; founder Richard Liu started out with a Beijing electronics stall in 1998 and took the business online in 2004.

Temu's name was originally short for what slogan?

Temu's name condenses the slogan 'Team Up, Price Down'; the marketplace launched in the US in September 2022 under PDD Holdings, the company behind Pinduoduo.

Fast-fashion giant Shein moved its headquarters in 2022 to which country?

Shein, founded in Nanjing in 2008 as ZZKKO by Chris Xu, shifted its headquarters to Singapore in 2022, registering Roadget Business Pte there as its holding company.

Buy-now-pay-later firm Klarna was founded in 2005 in which country?

Klarna was founded in Stockholm, Sweden, in 2005 by Sebastian Siemiatkowski, Niklas Adalberth and Victor Jacobsson, who had pitched the idea at a Stockholm School of Economics competition and lost.

Which Canadian shopping centre was the world's largest mall from 1981 to 2004?

West Edmonton Mall opened in 1981 and held the world's-largest title until 2004; it houses an indoor amusement park, a water park with a wave pool and a full-size ice rink.

The King of Prussia mall, one of America's largest, opened in which year?

King of Prussia opened in 1963 as an open-air plaza anchored by an E. J. Korvette store and was later enclosed; a 2016 expansion joined its Plaza and Court sections into one building.

Which Dubai shopping centre contains Ski Dubai, the Middle East's first indoor ski resort?

Ski Dubai, with its 85-metre indoor slope and resident penguins, sits inside Mall of the Emirates, which opened in 2005 in the Al Barsha district alongside a Kempinski hotel.

The Country Club Plaza's Baroque and Moorish Revival design echoes which Spanish city?

Developer J. C. Nichols modeled the Plaza on Seville, whose Giralda Tower it copies at half scale; opened in 1923, it is regarded as the first planned suburban shopping centre in the US.

The Burlington Arcade, built in 1818, runs from Burlington Gardens to which London street?

The arcade runs north from Piccadilly to Burlington Gardens beside Burlington House; Lord George Cavendish opened it in 1819, policed by top-hatted Beadles who banned whistling and running.

Which ancient Roman complex is often called the world's oldest shopping mall?

Trajan's Market, built around AD 100–110 by Apollodorus of Damascus beside Trajan's Forum, is often called the world's oldest shopping mall, though many scholars read its 150 rooms as administrative offices.

Khan el-Khalili is a famous bazaar in which city?

Khan el-Khalili lies in Islamic Cairo near al-Azhar Mosque; Mamluk emir Djaharks el-Khalili founded it as a caravanserai in 1382.

Chatuchak, the world's largest weekend market, is in which city?

Chatuchak Weekend Market covers about 35 acres in northern Bangkok, with more than 15,000 stalls and some 200,000 visitors each weekend.

La Boqueria market has its entrance on which famous Barcelona boulevard?

La Boqueria's main entrance opens onto La Rambla under its Modernista iron-and-glass sign; a market was first recorded on the site in 1217, and the current iron roof dates from 1914.

London's Borough Market, in Southwark, claims to have existed since which year?

Borough Market dates its origins to 1014, when a market stood at the southern end of London Bridge, and it celebrated its millennium in 2014; the present buildings date from the 1850s.

Portobello Road Market, famous for antiques, is in which London district?

Portobello Road runs through Notting Hill in west London; the antiques market, busiest on Saturdays, grew after dealers moved in from the closed Caledonian Market in the late 1940s.

The KaDeWe department store, opened in 1907, is in which city?

KaDeWe, short for Kaufhaus des Westens ('Department Store of the West'), opened on Berlin's Wittenbergplatz in 1907 and is famous for its sixth-floor food hall.

During the Soviet era, who was the sole vendor in Moscow's GUM store?

The building facing Red Square is once again a shopping mall.

Mitsukoshi, founded in 1673 as Echigo-ya, originally sold what?

Mitsui Takatoshi opened Echigo-ya in Edo in 1673 to sell kimono fabric; in 1683 it pioneered fixed-price cash sales in the shop instead of door-to-door selling on credit.

The world's oldest department store trading under its original name (1838) is in which country?

David Jones, founded in Sydney, Australia, in 1838 by Welsh-born merchant David Jones, bills itself as the oldest department store in the world trading under its founding name.

The Hudson's Bay Company, long North America's oldest corporation, was founded in which year?

Charles II granted the Hudson's Bay Company its royal charter on 2 May 1670, giving it a fur-trade monopoly over Rupert's Land; the retailer entered creditor protection and closed its stores in 2025.

London department store Liberty is most famous for what?

Liberty is best known for its floral print fabrics, such as the Tana Lawn cotton prints, sold since Arthur Lasenby Liberty opened on Regent Street in 1875; its mock-Tudor building on Great Marlborough Street dates from 1924.

Fortnum & Mason, established in London in 1707, was founded as what type of shop?

Fortnum & Mason began in 1707 as a grocery store in St James's, founded by grocer Hugh Mason and William Fortnum, a footman in Queen Anne's household who sold the palace's used candle ends.

A 'loss leader' is a product priced low to do what?

A loss leader is sold at or below cost to draw customers in to buy other goods; supermarkets' cheap milk or a holiday-season games console are classic examples.

In retail, what is a planogram?

A planogram is a diagram of shelf product placement showing where each item sits on the fixtures; chains use it to standardise displays and measure sales per shelf.

Prices like $19.99, also called charm prices, are an example of what kind of pricing?

Charm prices ending in 9 are psychological pricing: shoppers read $19.99 as nearer nineteen than twenty dollars because they weigh the leftmost digit first, the 'left-digit effect'.

QR codes were invented in 1994 by Denso Wave to label what?

Masahiro Hara's team at Denso Wave, a Toyota subsidiary, devised the QR code in 1994 to track automobile parts through factories, packing far more data than a barcode and using Reed–Solomon error correction.

Tesco's Clubcard loyalty scheme had gained over how many users by 2021?

Clubcard launched in February 1995, with dunnhumby analysing the data for then-marketing director Terry Leahy; by 2021 Tesco counted more than 20 million Clubcard users, helped by Clubcard Prices discounts.

The US purchase plan 'layaway' is known Down Under by what name?

Down Under, layaway is 'lay-by': the shop holds the goods while the customer pays in instalments and hands them over only once the last payment is made.

Which company created Small Business Saturday in 2010?

American Express launched Small Business Saturday on 27 November 2010 to push holiday spending to local merchants; it falls between Black Friday and Cyber Monday.

Buy Nothing Day, a protest against consumerism, is promoted by which magazine?

Vancouver artist Ted Dave founded Buy Nothing Day in 1992 and the anti-consumerist magazine Adbusters took it up and promoted it worldwide; in North America it falls on Black Friday.

A researcher who poses as a customer to assess service quality is known as what?

A mystery shopper visits a store anonymously, buying or asking for service, then reports on staff and conditions; the practice grew from 1940s private-investigator checks on employee honesty.

The world's first duty-free shop opened in 1947 at which airport?

Brendan O'Regan opened the world's first duty-free shop at Shannon Airport in County Clare in 1947, serving transatlantic passengers on refuelling stops, after the Irish parliament passed the Customs-Free Airport Act that year.

Hero of Alexandria's 1st-century coin-operated machine dispensed what?

The first modern vending machines, in 1880s England, sold postcards.

Joy Mangano's first hit invention, pitched on QVC in the early 1990s, was what?

Mangano invented the self-wringing Miracle Mop in 1990 and sold 18,000 in one QVC appearance in 1992 after insisting on pitching it herself; the 2015 film 'Joy' dramatised the story.

Who opened the Jamaica, Queens, store of 4 August 1930 often called America's first supermarket?

Michael J. Cullen, a former grocery-chain manager whose bosses rejected his plan for huge cut-price self-service stores, opened King Kullen in a Jamaica, Queens, garage on 4 August 1930; the Smithsonian calls it the first supermarket.

Oxfam began in 1942 as the Oxford Committee for what?

The Oxford Committee for Famine Relief formed in October 1942 to press for food shipments to blockaded Greece; the 'Oxfam' telegraph abbreviation became the official name in 1965.

In pawnbroking, what are the items left as collateral called?

Goods left as security with a pawnbroker are called pledges, and the borrower is the pledgor; slang for pawning includes 'hocked' and 'up the spout'.

A flea market is also known in the US by what name?

In the American West a flea market is often called a swap meet, a name from early events where collectors traded goods; 'flea market' itself translates the French marché aux puces.

Sotheby's was founded in London in 1744 by Samuel Baker, who traded in what?

Samuel Baker was a bookseller whose first auction, in March 1744, sold the library of Sir John Stanley for £826; the Sotheby name came in 1778 via his nephew John Sotheby.

A. T. Stewart, whose 1846 'Marble Palace' pioneered the New York department store, was born where?

He abandoned plans to join the clergy and sailed for New York in 1823.

Bernard Arnault took control of which luxury group in 1989?

Arnault became chairman and chief executive of LVMH in 1989 after a takeover battle, then bought dozens of houses from Bulgari to Loro Piana; he had studied engineering at École Polytechnique.

Charles Lewis Tiffany of Tiffany & Co. is credited with creating America's first what?

Tiffany published the 'Blue Book' in 1845, widely credited as America's first retail catalog and issued annually ever after; in 1851 he adopted the English sterling standard of 925 parts silver.

The supermarket retail format first appeared around 1930 in which country?

The supermarket format of self-service, cash-and-carry, cut prices and high volume emerged in the United States around 1930, with Ralphs in Los Angeles and the Queens store the Smithsonian calls the first supermarket.

The term 'mall' originally referred to what?

In retail use, 'mall' first meant a pedestrian promenade with shops along it, borrowing from tree-lined walks such as London's Mall; by the late 1960s it had become the generic term for enclosed shopping centres.

Supercenter chain Meijer was founded in 1934 in which state?

Dutch-born barber Hendrik Meijer opened his first grocery in Greenville, Michigan, in 1934 during the Depression; the Grand Rapids-based chain pioneered the one-stop supercenter with its Thrifty Acres stores, decades before Walmart's first Supercenter.

Publix, the Florida supermarket chain founded in 1930, is owned mainly by whom?

Publix is owned by its present and past employees through a stock-ownership plan and direct purchases, with founder George Jenkins's family holding a minority, making it one of the largest employee-owned companies in the US.

Texas grocer H-E-B was founded in 1905 by Florence Butt in which town?

Florence Butt opened the C.C. Butt Grocery Store in Kerrville in 1905 with $60; her son Howard E. Butt took over in the 1920s and gave the chain his initials.

Bernard Kroger founded the supermarket chain that bears his name in 1883 in which city?

Bernard Kroger opened the Great Western Tea Company in downtown Cincinnati in 1883 with $372 of savings, and the chain kept its headquarters in the city.

The first two Home Depot stores opened in 1979 in the suburbs of which US city?

Marcus and Blank opened the first two stores on 22 June 1979 in Doraville and Decatur, suburbs of Atlanta, in former Treasure Island hypermarket buildings of about 60,000 square feet each.

Why did the founder of Lidl pay a retired teacher 1,000 marks for the rights to 'Lidl'?

Legal reasons blocked him from using his father's old partner's name, so he tracked down painter Ludwig Lidl after reading a newspaper article about him.

E-commerce firm Mercado Libre was founded in 1999 in which city?

Marcos Galperin launched Mercado Libre from a garage in Buenos Aires in August 1999 while finishing his Stanford MBA; the company later moved its headquarters to Montevideo and incorporated in Delaware.