Robinson’s, May Co. to Join Sunday : Retail: The two department store chains will combine and take a hyphenated name during mock wedding receptions with all the frills.
With mock wedding receptions at 57 stores, mostly in Southern California, the Robinson’s and May Co. department store chains will take each other’s names and officially combine Sunday.
After losing an apostrophe and gaining a hyphen, the new Robinsons-May is hoping to save its parent company $15 million a year. At the same time, the subsidiary of St. Louis-based May Department Stores will attempt to forge a new identity that combines the more upscale image of Robinson’s with the lower-price reputation of May Co.
For now, officials of the Los Angeles-based chain are scurrying to put up new store signs, treating employees to parties featuring wedding cake and presents and stocking stores with balloons and fresh flowers that will be handed to shoppers Sunday.
“Getting married is not easy,” quipped Robinsons-May spokesman Jim Watterson. “Robinsons-May won’t be a carbon copy of either the former Robinson’s or the former May.”
The price tag for this wedding was 550 jobs lost when the Robinson’s headquarters in Los Angeles closed last week. Ten stores were also closed, but Robinsons-May was able to absorb all of the more than 1,500 employees from the closed stores, which will mean more salespeople waiting on customers, Watterson said.
The chain is spending $120 million to expand the stores’ cosmetics departments and is launching a $10-million expansion of the Mission Viejo store, he said. Robinsons-May also plans to open three stores this fall.
Retail analyst Edward A. Weller said the chain faces a challenge as it combines two very different department stores.
“May may have been a little more promotional than May liked, and Robinson’s was less volume-oriented than they liked,” said Weller, an analyst with Montgomery Securities in San Francisco. “I think they’re hoping to get the best of both these companies for the combined chain,” he said, noting that the old Robinson’s carried many upscale brands that were not available to the old May Co.
May said last October that it would close 12 stores, but it decided to keep the operations at the Sherman Oaks Galleria and MainPlace Santa Ana. In those malls, and at four others, Robinsons-May will continue to operate two stores. In some cases, the stores will carry slightly different merchandise, such as apparel in one and housewares in the other, Watterson said.
Westside shopper Shoshana Zolkas, who patronized each chain “depending on my mood,” believes that the combination is a good idea. “I’m kind of happy about it. It will mean a wider variety of products in one store.”
