Barneys New York
Barneys New York is a luxury department store chain with locations in major cities across America. The company began in 1923, when Barney Pressman opened his first store in Manhattan with money he raised by pawning his wife's engagement ring. Since then, Barneys has become synonymous with wealth and luxury, offering pricey apparel and accessories from the world's top designers. The store is easily recognized by its brilliant red awnings and imaginative window displays. In late 2004, the company was acquired in a surprise bid by discount retailer Jones Apparel Group, which announced its intentions to expand the chain aggressively in the near future. The company currently operates three flagship stores: its original location on Madison Avenue in New York City, as well as locations in Beverly Hills and Chicago. It also operates three regional department stores in Manhasset, Boston's exclusive Chestnut Hill section, and Seattle. The company is constructing a second Boston store in Copley Place, a luxury downtown shopping mall.
The company also operates a casualwear concept, called Barneys Co-Op, in several markets across the country. Barneys Co-Op offers casual apparel and accessories for younger patrons in a trendy environment that breaks from the store's traditionally stuffy atmosphere. The Co-Op was originally a fixture inside the department stores, but is now being developed as a freestanding concept in markets where conditions do not favor the construction of a full department store, or where a department store already exists. The Co-Op concept range in size from 9,000 to 20,000 square feet (800 to 2000 m²) , making it larger than most traditional apparel chains but smaller than department stores, which can range in size from 60,000 to 200,000+ square feet (6,000 to 20,000 m²). There are Co-Op locations in Chicago, Miami Beach, Atlanta, Costa Mesa (a community in California's posh Orange County), and in three wealthy New York City neighorhoods: Chelsea, SoHo, and the Upper West Side.
Pop culture references to Barneys are numerous. Carrie Bradshaw (played by Sarah Jessica Parker), the lead character of HBO's program Sex and the City, haunted the New York City flagship with near-obsessive regularity. Barneys played a memorable role in an episode of the 90s sitcom Seinfeld, in which Elaine Benes (played by Julia Louis-Dreyfus) causes a stir among her incredulous friends by purchasing a pair of expensive shoes from the New York store. References in the sitcom Will & Grace, including the episode where all protagonists end up at sale day at Barneys, are a recurring theme of the show. The Beverly Hills flagship was featured in the 1997 film Romy and Michele's High School Reunion, in a scene where Lisa Kudrow mounts the store's impressive four-story staircase. Such mentions simply add to the store's reputation as the one of the premier luxury goods establishments in the world.
Barneys' American competitors in the luxury retail sector include Saks Fifth Avenue, Bloomingdale's, Nordstrom, and Neiman Marcus.
External link
http://www.barneys.com/index_flash.html
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