A tale of tar and feathering: the retail price inventory method and the Englishman

Abstract

This paper examines the implementation and operation of a simple method of inventory valuation: the retail price inventory method. Previous research has examined the method's widespread adoption by US department stores during the 1920s. In particular, attention has focused on the disciplinary properties of the method and the creation of visibilities which recast power relations within the store. This paper attempts to extend existing scholarly enquiry by crossing the Atlantic to follow the practical adoption of the method by an Irish department store in the 1930s. The case reveals the extent of employee resistance to the method's adoption, culminating in a physical attack on the accountant employed with its execution. More importantly however, implemented incorrectly, the method failed to deliver the promised surveillance role, but instead yielded an unanticipated consequence. It revealed the gross profitability of the retail component of store trade and hence supported a managerial initiative to expand this side of business activities to the eventual detriment of the former resistant departmental buyers. The paper therefore acknowledges the broader role of a seemingly neutral accounting technique and reinforces the importance of recognising the organisational context of accounting practice.

Keywords:

• department store
• Foucault
• inventory control
• retail history
• retail price inventory method

Notes

1. For an insight into the role of the department store in the creation of a consumer culture, see: Chaney 1983; Featherstone 1991; Ferguson 1992; Finkelstein 1991; Glennie 1995; Laermans 1993; McCracken 1988; Nava 1995.

2. For a history of the retail practices of the early US department store see: Appel 1930; Hower 1943; Klassen 1992; Leach 1984 and 1993; Mahoney 1955; Resseguie 1964; Twyman 1954.

3. The use of weather reports to explain trading performance was a common procedure. For example, the sales records of one US department store in 1902 contain a weather diary alongside the daily sales results. Source: C. F. Hovey Collection, Mss 776, H846, V5, Historical Collections, Baker Library, Harvard Business School.

4. Our previous research on the retail price inventory method included a consultation of the archival records of the London stores Harrods and Selfridges, both of which used the method.

5. The minutes of meetings of the Controllers Congress are held at the Baker Library, Harvard University.

6. For a history of the European department store see: Adburgham 1964; Alexander 1970; Corina 1978; Crossick and Jaumain 1999; Davis 1966; Fraser 1981; Jefferys 1954; Miller 1989; Moss and Turton 1989; Rappaport 1993; Williams 1982; Zola 1992.

7. Other new techniques included consumer credit controls (Jeacle and Walsh 2002) and departmental overhead allocation (Jeacle 2003).