Advisory Board

Testimonials

>> click here for latest news

Partners

Key Partners

Industry Poll

Which of the following new emerging markets do you think will show the fastest growth over the next 5 years?

Brazil
Eastern Europe
Egypt
India
Russia
Thailand
Vietnam

>> view results

Click here to view our BLOG

Knowledge Centre

Arc Worldwide, Leo Burnett Group report

Financial Times World Retailing Report

IBM The Performance Manager

WPP - Retailing in the Recession

Global Retail 250 Website Index Report

WGSN Berlin City Guide

A demandtec eBook: nextGEN of Merchandising & Marketing Customer Insights

IBM Smarter Consumer Report

WGSN Think Tank Consumer Forecast: Consumer Attitudes 2011

WGSN What’s In Store Visual Merchandising Analysis: VM Overview March 2010

Hall of Fame Biographies

Aaron Montgomery Ward

Montgomery Ward

American merchant Aaron Montgomery Ward (1843-1913) helped create mail order retailing and built the large mail-order house which bears his name.

Born in Chatham, New York, Ward moved to Niles, Michigan with his parents. He went to work at 14 in a barrel factory and later in a brickyard. He worked in the Chicago store that became Marshall Field; then he was a travelling salesman for a wholesale dry-goods house.

Aware of farmers' criticism of the high prices at country stores and their condemnation of what they considered exorbitant middlemen's profits, Ward conceived the idea of founding a mail-order house that would cut the cost of sales by purchasing direct from manufacturers and selling direct to retail purchasers. All transactions would be for cash, thereby eliminating the costs country storekeepers incurred by selling on credit. Ward also inaugurated the policy of allowing purchasers to return, without cost, goods they considered unacceptable.

Ward and his partner started their business with only a $2,400 stock of goods housed in a loft and displayed in a one-page catalogue but the enterprise was immediately successful. The 1876 catalogue had 150 pages, and annual sales reached $1m by 1888. At the time of Ward's death, annual sales were $40m. There were several reasons for his great success, including his intimate knowledge of farmers' desires and the prices they would pay, his ability to get lower prices from manufacturers by volume purchasing and the confidence customers gained by the return guaranty. He was fortunate in obtaining the support of the Farmers' National Grange, so he could advertise as "The Original Grange Supply House."

But Ward's career had its stormy aspects. Competition with Sears Roebuck was brisk, and Sears passed the Ward company in annual volume of sales in 1902. Also, conflict with country storekeepers was continuous and bitter. Storekeepers, regarding mail-order houses as a grave threat and tried a variety of methods to curtail their operations, including holding large ceremonies where mail-order catalogues were burned. Ward fought back by sending displays throughout the Midwest and by trumpeting his conviction that mail-order had saved farmers millions by forcing country stores to lower prices.

Retiring from active management in 1901, Ward undertook much expensive litigation to preserve Chicago's lake front as a park and guard it against commercial encroachment. After his death his wife gave about $8.5m to Northwestern University.