Whatever happened to competition? Portland-based department store chain Meier & Frank used to have competition. Then one by one the competition was assimilated, bought out or went bankrupt.
At least there was some consolation in knowing that buying and merchandising decisions were still made locally. Then last August, parent company May Department Stores "consolidated" backoffice functions for its westcoast Robinson's-May and northwest Meier & Frank chains. Bye, bye any local presence beyond the front line retail sales clerks.
Now, it appears that May, which operates 445 department stores around the country under a handful of names, and Federated, which operates 397 department stores, including Bloomingdale's, Macy's, the Bon Marche, Burdines, Goldsmith's, Lazarus, Rich's and Stern's, want to merge. This is tantamount to GM and Ford and DaimlerChrysler merging. At least right now there is still an duopoly in department store retailing with May in one corner and Federated/Macy in the other corner. Combine them and we may as well have The Department Store.
Think of all the money that would be saved in eliminating all of these "local" store names. Gone would be the need for branding at all. After all, when you have no competition, what's the point? If there was ever a time for someone to start a new department store chain, this is it. Anyone?