When was belk founded

Years of listening to salesmen had provided an education beyond what he could have found in a college classroom. Experience had taught Belk how to buy. He knew the prices of raw materials and what labor was involved in making a pair of shoes or a shirt. As a result, he bought well. When the goods arrived in Monroe, Belk sold them straight from their heavy wooden packing crates. With each sale he turned a small profit, and he was soon back on the road again.

As the business grew, Belk hired more clerks, but he needed someone who could tend the store in his absence, in whom he could have absolute and unqualified confidence to serve customers as well as he did. John had married two years earlier and begun a family. Times were tough, but he had earned enough to repay a portion of the money he had borrowed from his brother for his education. Leave medicine, he urged his brother, and come into business.

They talked it over through the night. By daybreak, John had decided that his future was in retailing, not medicine.

John took a one-half interest in the business and moved to Monroe with his wife and young daughter. As soon as a painter could be found, the New York Racket sign came down and was replaced by one that read "W. Belk and Bro. William Henry Belk was ready to sell anybody anything. His store was a combination of services, part novelty and part dry goods, which aimed for the business of the solid, hard-working people in the community and in the county.

He promoted one-cent items—pencils, fishhooks, matches, blacking , marbles, sheets of paper, soap, and buttons—but his stock was heaviest in overalls for the well-digger, spectacles for the grandmother, and suits for Sunday meetings.

Belk had a feeling for the working people. He knew they wanted high-quality goods for their hard-earned dollars. He searched for ways to promote his trade in the city and beyond.

When country folks came to town to load their wagons with supplies, he arranged with some to have a Belk sign painted on the side of their wagons in exchange for extra bolts of cloth. Christmas brought a new level of success.

Although others also sold staples at low prices for cash, William Henry Belk held his own against stiff competition. Sales for were six times that. Soon other Charlotte merchants were imitating Belk. The field of credit disaster, the slaughter pens of the sheriff and the auction rooms are our prolific play-grounds.

Belk replied by upping the ante. He opened a "bargain shoe counter" and offered to outfit men, ladies, misses, and children at even lower prices. He negotiated with manufacturers and mills in the area for bargains on piece goods and the best fabrics.

Belk also shopped the Cannon mills in Kannapolis and even invested in textile operations and other enterprises that kept him close to the demands of the market. He added mail-order service and favored one-cent items, from fishhooks to marbles, that helped draw young customers into the store.

And he often worked as his own "puller-in," standing at the front doors chatting with passersby and inviting them into his store. By Belk had established a loose cooperative buying network that tied together the purchasing power of the Belk stores in Charlotte, Monroe, Union, and Chester, as well as two other stores in which the Belk brothers had no financial interest.

They purchased goods in large lots and passed the savings on to their partners. A buyer in New York scouted the market on their behalf to find bargains in hats, for example, and the Belks bought as many as fifteen hundred pairs of pants at once Customers would find the Belk brothers all over their stores.

They were the first in the building each morning, organizing the display tables and merchandise for the day and supervising the young check boys as they swept the floors and pulled the tarpaulins off the display tables. Throughout the day, when clerks were overrun with business, Henry waded into the crowd of customers, eager to sell and thriving on the exchange with people. He always carried a small pair of scissors in his vest pocket, which he used to snip the corner of a measure of cloth before he tore it across with a flourish.

The brothers remained on duty until the late evening hours. Closing time was simply a function of the traffic and the competition; no store wanted its selling floor dark when another store up the street still had bright lights burning for customers. Such a schedule was nothing new to Belk. Heath had taught him the rudiments of retail clerking when he was fourteen. Moreover, Belk had been raised in a simple home marked by early years of severe economic hardship.

Hard work had been a necessity as well as a virtue honored daily with Bible readings. He took these lessons learned from his mother to Charlotte, where they were as much a part of his business as cash sales and low prices. Indeed, Henry seemed all but consumed by his efforts to retain an edge over his competitors. His clever ads helped, but his success was due to a keen eye for opportunity and a single-mindedness of purpose.

He lived in rooms on the upper floor of the taller of his two buildings and took his meals across the street at the Central Hotel. Businessmen, including bachelors like Belk and newspaper editor J. The John M. Belk Memorial Fund was created by the Belk stores in following the death of Dr. The fund primarily supported the building and remodeling of Presbyterian churches across the South; however, other worthy causes were also supported, particularly health and education endeavors.

Soon after William Henry Belk's death in , his heirs combined the charitable portion of his estate with the John M. Today, The Belk Foundation continues to operate as a family foundation that seeks inspiration in the vision of its founders.

The founder's other sons, John and Tom, were also active in the company. Six months after his father's death, Henry opened the company's first shopping center store in Florida. This store marked a dramatic break from Belk traditions: a New York design firm created a fancy interior, music was played, and merchandise was displayed for self-service.

This contrasted sharply with the Belk stores' trademark features of spare, no-nonsense decor and an army of well-trained sales clerks. Henry opened several more stores afterward without consulting his family, and by legal disputes were brewing among family members and other shareholders. Although lawsuits were filed, they eventually were dropped. Later that year, Belk Stores Services, Inc.

Though BSS cut all ties with Henry's chain of department stores in November , family feuding would continue throughout the next four decades. John would later advance to chairman of BSS, with Tom as president. The Belks' private-label business was now thriving, and by it accounted for a major share of the buying office's inventory.

In the late s, the Belks department stores had nearly peaked in the South, with stores in 16 states. In , Belk acquired its only viable competitor in the region, the Efird department stores. During the s, the company had to adjust to a changing retail environment in the South. Stores that could once count on their reputations as local institutions found themselves in the midst of a highly mobile population that was attracted to the offerings of big-city stores.

The largely autonomous and divergent stores making up the Belk group were not prepared to compete. A more mobile society, newly popular shopping centers, and the South's expanding economy presented BSS with the task of uniting its network of stores.

In , there were stores in 17 states. By , the stores were, for the first time, presented to the public as a unit instead of a string of independent operations. Change was still slow, however. At a time when more buyers were using credit, 87 percent of Belk's sales were still cash. In , extensive meetings were held by BSS and its long-range planning committees to chart the company's future.

Meanwhile, more stores were added to the fold: 14 opened in and 16 in The new stores were larger and used modern management techniques, such as computerized payrolls and centralized personnel departments. As planning and coordination gained in importance, so did BSS's role.

By assuming more leadership, it accelerated the changes as the stores moved from budget to fashion merchandise. Expansion continued, and between and more than 50 stores were opened. Several of the company's signature downtown stores were closed in favor of stores in the prospering outlying malls. Credit and data processing systems were centralized and upgraded. Another change was Belk's pursuit of upscale brand names. Even Belk stores in smaller towns upgraded their look and merchandise.

This served to add new customers to an already loyal clientele. Under the direction of president and CEO Thomas Belk, the company succeeded in transforming its operations in order to meet the demands of style-conscious shoppers during the s, as opposed to catering strictly to a clientele looking for thrift, durability, and value.

For example, Belk hosted its first fashion buying show in New York in , and within four years representatives from the nation's top fashion lines were competing for representation in the show. This further consolidated buying and proved Belk's place in the fashion retail market.

Marking the change from bargain chain to fashion stores was top designer Oscar de la Renta's appearance at a grand reopening of a Belk store in Though some stores retained the small-town, bargain-budget flavor of Belk's founder's vision, others moved to suburban malls and shopping centers. The company celebrated its th birthday in while opening a huge new BSS office complex in Charlotte. The company would later close its New York office and consolidate buying operations at the new facility.

Though the retail industry in general and the department store segment in particular were disrupted by recession, competition from mega-discounters, mergers, and multi-billion-dollar bankruptcies in the early s, one observer characterized Belk Stores as "a rock of stability. In an effort to focus on its strongest markets, the company sold a few stores in marginal markets, maintaining its strongholds in North and South Carolina.

Hot on the heels of rumors that longtime affiliate Leggett Stores Inc. The addition of Leggett's more than 40 stores increased Belk Corporation's amalgamation of stores by nearly 20 percent and, perhaps more importantly, ensured the continuation of Leggett's long-running affiliation with Belk Stores Services. Belk Stores withstood an unplanned management transition in January when year-old Thomas Belk died following gall bladder surgery.

His three sons, Thomas M. McKay Belk, and John R.