Nordstrom’s July 4 Special: A Day Off for All Employees

In the world of retail, a holiday means more than employees getting paid time and a half. It means more potential customers with free time to shop, which is why most department stores will be open Independence Day.

But not Nordstrom.

For the first time, all 92 stores across the country will be closed July 4. All 30,000 employees can stay home--or go shopping at Macy’s or Robinson’s-May.

“We made a commitment to our employees, and they thought it important that they be able to spend some time with their families,” said Leslie Harris, California public relations director for Nordstrom Inc. “We decided if it’s important to them, it’s important to us.”

The employees, who are not represented by a union, will be paid for the holiday.

Seattle-based Nordstrom has little to lose from staying closed on the holiday, said Robert Kahn, a Lafayette-based management consultant and publisher of the Retailing Today newsletter. “When you come down to it, what they do on the Fourth of July isn’t going to make or break it.”

But it could gain indirectly, he said, by building goodwill among its employees and in the community. “We’ve sort of lost patriotism on an important day,” he said. “I think it’s as important as Thanksgiving, and the stores are all closed on that day.”

In the retailing world, Nordstrom has often acted differently, Kahn said.

“Their compensation is different than other department stores,” he said. “Their people make more money, and they stay with them longer. There’s a bit of old-fashioned loyalty in it.”

Marshall Kline, a Los Angeles-based retail buyer, said Nordstrom’s move is good for morale and smart business.

July 4th isn’t usually a big shopping holiday, he said. “Unless the temperature soars above 100 and people are desperate to get away from the heat, I’d guess that shopping is going to be low on the hierarchy of things people want to do,” he said.

Other big department store chains have dug themselves into a hole of not only being open on the Fourth of July but of heavily promoting sales for the weekend, Kline said. The constant promotions have become an endless treadmill for many retailers, who must continue to discount their goods to match or better the previous years sales figures.

“Nordstrom has a different philosophy of merchandising,” Kline said. “It is far less reliant on sales.”

Nordstrom has gone back and forth on the July 4 opening. Many years ago, its stores were closed on the holiday. Then for about four years they were open, Harris said. Last year, the Orange County and Los Angeles stores were closed again. For the first time this year, all Nordstroms were closed Jan. 1. The stores also are shut Christmas, Thanksgiving and Easter.