The Urge to Splurge: A Social History of Shopping

As a Merchandising minor in college I devour books on the history of retail, and this one is one of my favorites. I definately recommend this book for anyone studing merchandising or the sociology.

The Urge to Splurge is, according to its subtitle, a Social History of Shopping. It isn't an academic book, but with its attention to history and detail, its wide range of subtopics having to do with shopping, and the excellent bibliography for further reading, it can serve as a reference work as well as an entertaining pop culture book. Laura Byrne Paquet, a Canadian writer of romance fiction and Ottawa guide books, gives no hint of the distinctive (and different) styles that normally accompany both romance novels and travel writing. The tone here is conversational, even casual, while being very informative. The Urge to Splurge covers Tupperware parties, Avon ladies, mail order shopping, TV infomercials, online shopping, compulsive shopping disorder, kleptomania, shoplifting, the differences between men and women shoppers, malls, markets, bargaining, eBay, department stores, and more. You'll learn about the transition from bargaining to fixed prices. Paquet tells us about the first escalator in Britain, which was in Harrod's and had no steps. "It was just a conveyor belt, so thrill-seeking passengers who dared to get on had to hang onto handrails for dear life." Yikes. I was reminded that it was only a few decades ago that Sunday shopping was even possible in most places in North America and Britain. Long after Sunday shopping was the norm in the States, my husband and I spent a month in London and were disappointed to find that nothing was open on Sundays. After the first few restless Sundays, we started planning ahead, finding the few museums and shops that were open on Sunday afternoons, and eventually found ourselves looking forward to Sundays as the day when we could walk the streets and parks of London without the noise of the weekday traffic. Now Sunday is much the same as any other day of the week, shopping-wise. The Urge to Splurge will make you think about your own shopping memories or maybe re-think your attitudes about shopping. The section on Tupperware reminded me that a good friend once invited me to a Tupperware party and that I had turned her down, for the very good reason that I simply could not become the sort of person who goes to Tupperware parties. It seemed I had no problem with being the sort of person who is a snob. There's plenty of historical and social history in The Urge to Splurge, as well as a fair amount of interesting trivia. Perhaps you already knew that eBay did not really begin as a Pez dispenser trading site, or how many hundreds of thousands of dollars Jackie Kennedy Onassis spent on clothes each year. This is just a tiny bit of what you will learn from the book. My only complaint about the book is that it has no index.

Books on buying and selling are beset with perils. Issues, from exploitation through gender politics to environmental ethics rise like vipers from the grass. Do you deplore the "Christmas rush" as "over-commercilized? In this informative and entertaining account, Paquet skirts these dangers while keeping a wary, but knowing, eye on them. Brimming with information and told with a verve rarely encountered, this book is a prize to read - and more than once.Buying and selling, she reminds us, are as old as human existence. The earliest farms meant surplus - "extra grain could be traded for a neighbour's goat", says Paquet. From these early exchanges, Paquet moves through market stalls and fairs, a commercial method lasting many centuries. "Shop", she explains, is a term going back to the 13th Century, but "shopping" had to wait until George III's era. "Shopper" took another century to become current. A reluctant shopper herself, Paquet leavens her "social history" with some lively personal experiences. A "Ladies Night In" at Holt-Renfrew in downtown Ottawa proved a breath-taking experience. The promotion line was perfume and sampling excesses drove her outside into the night air. The free martinis might have helped force the exit.Shopping is a two-sided affair. Paquet cleverly portrays the problems of bringing seller and buyer together for a successful transaction. Small towns had fairs and permanent shops for centuries in the Old World and the New. Buyers rarely had far to go, but selection was limited. Factory-made goods overturned long-established shopping patterns in many ways. The goods were cheaper, meaning more people could buy them. The buyers, earning money in factories, could purchase more than in previous times. The choice of goods increased as competition led to variety. The flood of new products drove the need for larger stores. Complicating the situation was the rise of suburbs, separating buyers and sellers.Paquet's description of these processes keeps your attention with her light, intimate style. Her social history sense conveys us through the invention of the cash register, the escalator, the use of window displays and arranging products inside the store. Her finest prose is expressed in the most revolutionary aspect of modern shopping. Early department stores maintained extensive staffs for waiting on customers. Clerks behind counters were supported by "cash girls" who took the order and your money, raced to a cashier's cage, often floors away, to record the purchase and obtain change. Racing back to the customer, still idling at the counter, the transaction was finally completed. "I have a sneaking suspicion those girls were really fit!", she proposes. All these fit children, some as young as twelve, were sacked when a new form of store arose - the self serve. "The customer had to do the work!", Paquet exclaims, almost as surprised as the buyers must have been.There are other forms of shopping than "