Neiman's Loses Marcus

Stanley Marcus, son and nephew of the founders of Neiman Marcus, passed away in Dallas. The luxury retailer's former president, chairman of the board and chairman of the executive committee was 96.

Marcus is given credit for establishing Neiman Marcus as a worldwide brand known for elegance and outrageous — and outrageously priced — specialty items (such as his-and-hers Beechcraft planes, which could be purchased from the Neiman Marcus catalog). He was responsible for elevating the catalog into a must-read that reached all corners of the fashion world. Legend has it that on a trip to London with his wife, Marcus was scolded by Britain's Princess Alexandra because she hadn't yet received her catalog. “Fortunately,” he said in his 1974 memoirs, “Minding the Store,” “we can always blame the Postal Service.”

His insistence on elegance carried over to his stores. His appreciation of art was demonstrated in the works of local artists that almost always showed up in corners and corridors of new Neiman Marcus stores, and he frequently lent parts of his own vast art collection.

But though he sought the world's wealthy carriage trade, he was also a practical, hard-headed businessman. During the Depression in the 1930s, when business sagged, he lowered her merchandising standards and his prices. “We want to sell the millionaire,” he said, “and we also want to sell his secretary.”

Marcus was the son of Herbert Marcus and the nephew of Carrie Marcus Neiman and Abraham Lincoln Neiman, who founded Neiman Marcus in 1907 in downtown Dallas. He went to work at the store in 1926, following graduation from Harvard, and was soon staging the first weekly fashion shows in the retail business. He also pioneered the practice of advertising in national fashion magazines.

He became president of Neiman Marcus in 1950 at his father's death (nearly tripling sales in his first year) and began expanding the organization's empire, building a new Dallas store and stores in Houston and Fort Worth. He sold the company in 1969 to Carter Hawley Hale, but stayed on as Neiman Marcus'president. (The deal also made the Marcus family the largest Carter Hawley Hale share-holding block.) He gave up the presidency to son Richard Marcus and became board chairman in 1972 and then chairman of the executive committee in 1976.

He notoriously combined Texas connections and fashion positioning to build his organization's reputation. In 1946, six years before Dwight Eisenhower was elected, Marcus convinced Eisenhower (who grew up in Texas) to buy wife Mamie's inaugural gown at Neiman Marcus if and when the four-star General became president. And in January 1953, Mamie Eisenhower wore a Nettie Rosenstein gown, purchased at Neiman Marcus, to her husband's inaugural ball. Similarly, his store supplied the bridal gown, the mother of the bride's dress and the 12 bridesmaids'dresses when Luci Johnson — daughter of President Lyndon Johnson, another product of Texas — was married in the White House in 1966.