John Wanamaker — The New Kind of Store

The corner of Thirteenth and Market Streets is where American retail was reinvented. John Wanamaker opened his first store in eighteen sixty-one, but it was here, in eighteen seventy-six, that he built what he called a new kind of store, a grand emporium whose practices were so novel they became industry standards everywhere.

Wanamaker popularized the one-price system, ending the old custom of haggling, so every customer paid the same amount for the same item. He offered a money-back guarantee at a time when stores rarely accepted returns. He pioneered department-store advertising and lit his flagship with some of the earliest electric lights in Philadelphia. Beyond commerce, Wanamaker built schools, churches, and missions here and abroad. He served as United States Postmaster General from eighteen eighty-nine to eighteen ninety-three, where he championed rural free delivery and introduced the commemorative postage stamp to American philately. The grand store he built on this corner became a beloved Philadelphia institution for more than a century.