Lewis’s Department Store…
Our friends at the Potteries web site have made available to us a number of images relating to Lewis’s Department Store Hanley. These help us show what a major player Lewis’s was in its heyday – an important and popular template for many of today’s department stores. That there was also the full services of a branch bank in every store is what still makes Lewis’s stand out in the memory as innovative and extremely customer savvy. After all, a shopper could easily spend a day in the store when they could take morning coffee, lunch and afternoon tea in the restaurant, have their hair done, shop in a multitude of departments and even bank at their local store. In the days before credit cards and cash machines, this really was a most sophisticated marketing ploy. Please do enjoy the images on this page, (but remember they are very much of their time) and you can read more about the changing face of shopping in Hanley on the Potteries site at: www.thepotteries.org .
			1957 Amongst the delights to tempt the Hanley shopper are the “help yourself” cafeteria and an extensive range of hairdressing and beauty services.
1941 It might be Wartime, but everything is reduced in Lewis’s Sale. Those familiar words “Starts 9am Wednesday” haven’t changed in sale advertisements ever since !
Date unknown – but who cares, it’s Christmas! You can meet Santa in his grotto, and choose from what are billed as one thousand and one gifts in Lewis’s Toy Fair! (Nowadays that figure would probably have to be independently verified, as we are unable to use our imagination in the twenty-first century without a law suit pending)
		1967 Slightly reminiscent of the background displays on “Blue Peter” in the 1960s, this eye-catching window display offers our 1967 kids all they could wish for – including a Robin Hood Set, a drum, a toy cash register and various cuddlies, from dolls a rabbit and a panda to TWO different golliwogs! My, how times have changed…
© gut informiert 2007 to date