You've Got Mail!

When was the last time you found an actual letter in your mailbox? I can't even remember. There have been the occasional birthday cards from far-away friends (thank you!!!), but even those have dwindled. Forget about Christmas cards. Since the price of a "forever" stamp is now 66 cents, I doubt I can count on a festive display this year. I even get less bills. Not because I have less; many companies opted out of sending them as most are paid online.

There we are. Very little reason to open the mailbox other than to relieve it of the few magazines still limping in and the deluge of junk mail touting hearing aids, burial plots and prime wasteland in mid- Texas. 

I still get excited when I spot a catalog. Always have, even when I was a little girl and they were addressed to my mother. A favorite childhood pastime was to decide what to choose from each page. There had to be one thing, and some of those dresses from Lana Lobell were god-awful.

At times it was hard...

Although I grew up in a moderately-sized city, large enough to support several department stores and branches of a few New York specialty shops, it was still a thrill to order from a catalog. One in New Rochelle, just outside New York City, catered to my fashion-obsessed teen self. "The French Boot Shop" got the zeitgeist of the '50s-'60s. Long gone, it still has rabid fans, and the rare old catalog making it to Ebay gets snapped up fast.

Rare as hen's teeth...

Sears, Spiegel and Montgomery Ward were known as the "dream books" as they made delivery a reality throughout the country. I wonder what waiting for your order to arrive was like. Without other options it might have been bearable. We don't have patience for that today. Even a week seems like an eternity. Overnight is better.

Slo-mazon...

The catalog morphed into an important promotional tool. The goal was not to sell you this or that from page xx or xx but to pull you into the store. J Crew pretty much became the success it did on the strength of its catalog, as did Anthropologie. Both created worlds to either emulate or envy. Either way, they brought you in.

Anthro dreams by the dozen...

Sometimes it didn't work. J Peterman (yes the one from Seinfeld) publishes one of the most readable catalogs in direct mail history, but their foray into brick-and-mortar failed miserably. That white shirt was just another white shirt without the backstory that made it so irresistible on paper.

The pleasures of J Peterman...

We tend to save catalogs. I have a bunch from defunct stores that I loved looking through but never ordered from. Could be why they are defunct. Ann Taylor catalogs from the '90s were my guide to looking like a professional working woman. I can't throw them out, despite the giant shoulders and my long-standing retirement. 

Tailored for the job...

Along the way I picked up some late 1920's (pre crash) catalogs from Marshall Field. What fun they are to read, all the while thinking how little anyone knew what lay ahead.

Who could know...?

Many catalogs I receive are on account of my having shopped there and would physically do so again. J Jill, Talbot's, Johnny Was and J McLaughlin have stores in town. Land's End and LL Bean do not. They all present the merchandise pretty clearly. 

I recently read Boden is particularly successful in the US with its feminine/sporty/Princess Kate style. Boden has only one actual location (in London) so relies on its catalog for probably 99% of sales. Here is where I think that catalog misses the mark. The photographs are so lifestyle centric you can barely see the clothes. I would need to go online to do so. At the same time one must order online, where there are presumably many other items to choose from. Like my hybrid car, we have entered the age of multiple technologies. Get used to it.

What am I buying?

I will look through any catalog you send me. The holidays are not the same without The Swiss Colony and The Vermont Country Store. I will admire the bounty of your pecans at Sunnyland Farms, marvel at your variety of fruit cakes on Collin Street and always wonder who exactly are Harry & David. But the fashion catalogs will always be the true stuff of dreams.