Crate and Barrel
Encyclopedia
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
retail
Retail
Retail consists of the sale of physical goods or merchandise from a fixed location, such as a department store, boutique or kiosk, or by mail, in small or individual lots for direct consumption by the purchaser. Retailing may include subordinated services, such as delivery. Purchasers may be...
stores, based in Northbrook, Illinois
Northbrook, Illinois
Northbrook is a village located at the northern edge of Cook County, Illinois, which is also a North Shore suburb of Chicago. The population was 33,170 at the 2010 census....
, specializing in housewares, furniture
Furniture
Furniture is the mass noun for the movable objects intended to support various human activities such as seating and sleeping in beds, to hold objects at a convenient height for work using horizontal surfaces above the ground, or to store things...
(indoor and out), and home accessories. Its corporate name is Euromarket Designs, Inc. The company is wholly owned by Otto GmbH
Otto GmbH
The Otto group, or Otto , is the world's largest mail order company, operating in more than 20 countries. The family of executive board chairman Michael Otto owns the majority of the company. The company is based in Hamburg, Germany...
.
Founding
Gordon and Carole Segal opened the first Crate and Barrel store on December 7 1962, at age 23. The 1700 square feet (157.9 m²) space in part of an old elevator factory was located on Wells Street in the then-bohemianBohemian
A Bohemian is a resident of the former Kingdom of Bohemia, either in a narrow sense as the region of Bohemia proper or in a wider meaning as the whole country, now known as the Czech Republic. The word "Bohemian" was used to denote the Czech people as well as the Czech language before the word...
Old Town
Old Town, Chicago
Old Town is a neighborhood in Chicago, Illinois, bounded by the Ogden Ave. right-of-way on the northwest, Larrabee Street on the west, Clybourn Avenue on the southwest and Division Street on the south and Clark Street on the east and northeast. It spans across eastern parts of the community areas...
neighborhood of Chicago, Illinois. The inspiration was their honeymoon in Europe, where the Segals became interested in providing functional yet aesthetically pleasing products to young couples just starting out. Surprised to see that Europe had many beautiful and durable products at reasonable prices, they were inspired to start their own store in the United States.
The first store opened in response to a flourishing of world trade in home furnishings due to the early 1960s round of talks about the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade
General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade
The General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade was negotiated during the UN Conference on Trade and Employment and was the outcome of the failure of negotiating governments to create the International Trade Organization . GATT was signed in 1947 and lasted until 1993, when it was replaced by the World...
. The Segals sought out small Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
an companies that were not represented in America and negotiated direct purchases from these factories that could be sold to the consumer while avoiding a wholesaler's markup. To this day, a majority of Crate & Barrel's products are direct imports from Europe, though Thai
Thailand
Thailand , officially the Kingdom of Thailand , formerly known as Siam , is a country located at the centre of the Indochina peninsula and Southeast Asia. It is bordered to the north by Burma and Laos, to the east by Laos and Cambodia, to the south by the Gulf of Thailand and Malaysia, and to the...
, Mexican
Mexico
The United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...
and India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
n glass
Glass
Glass is an amorphous solid material. Glasses are typically brittle and optically transparent.The most familiar type of glass, used for centuries in windows and drinking vessels, is soda-lime glass, composed of about 75% silica plus Na2O, CaO, and several minor additives...
and textiles can also be found in their stores.
The Segals derived the company name by the materials that they originally used to display items in their Chicago store. The Segals were originally going to call their company "Barrel and Crate", but a friend suggested that they reverse the order of the words. They turned over the crates and barrels that the merchandise came in, let the wood excelsior spew out, and stacked up the china and glass. This helped emphasize their strongest selling point, that their products were direct imports.
In 1966, Segal and the designer Lon Habkirk visited the Design Research
Design Research (store)
Design Research or D/R was an innovative retail store founded in 1953 by Ben Thompson in Cambridge, Massachusetts; later it became a chain of a dozen stores across the United States; it went bankrupt in 1978...
store in Cambridge, Massachusetts, which had an "enormous influence" on their retailing approach. Habkirk later remarked: "Eventually we took the whole idea and translated it into a reproducible formula."
Growth
In 1968, the Segals opened their second store in the Plaza del LagoPlaza del Lago
Plaza del Lago is a shopping center at 1515 Sheridan Road in Wilmette, Illinois, United States which opened in 1928 as Spanish Court; it has been reported as the second-oldest shopping center in the United States designed for automobile use, and the first such center in the state of Illinois.-The...
shopping center in suburban Wilmette, Illinois
Wilmette, Illinois
Wilmette is a village in New Trier Township, Cook County, Illinois, United States. It is located north of Chicago's downtown district and has a population of 27,651. Wilmette is considered a bedroom community in the North Shore district...
, and third in Oak Brook, Illinois
Oak Brook, Illinois
Oak Brook is a village in DuPage and Cook Counties, in Illinois. The population was 8,702 at the 2000 census. A suburb of Chicago, it is the headquarters of McDonald's and Lions Clubs International.-History:...
in 1971. Its first store outside the Chicago area opened in Boston
Boston
Boston is the capital of and largest city in Massachusetts, and is one of the oldest cities in the United States. The largest city in New England, Boston is regarded as the unofficial "Capital of New England" for its economic and cultural impact on the entire New England region. The city proper had...
in 1977. In 1979, it opened its second Cambridge, Massachusetts
Cambridge, Massachusetts
Cambridge is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States, in the Greater Boston area. It was named in honor of the University of Cambridge in England, an important center of the Puritan theology embraced by the town's founders. Cambridge is home to two of the world's most prominent...
store in the building designed for the recently-closed Design Research
Design Research (store)
Design Research or D/R was an innovative retail store founded in 1953 by Ben Thompson in Cambridge, Massachusetts; later it became a chain of a dozen stores across the United States; it went bankrupt in 1978...
, which they had so admired.
By 1985, the chain had grown to 17 stores, and has continued to grow. In March 1995, it opened its first New York location (its 58th location), in Manhattan
Manhattan
Manhattan is the oldest and the most densely populated of the five boroughs of New York City. Located primarily on the island of Manhattan at the mouth of the Hudson River, the boundaries of the borough are identical to those of New York County, an original county of the state of New York...
. After selling a majority stake to German mail order company the Otto Group
Otto GmbH
The Otto group, or Otto , is the world's largest mail order company, operating in more than 20 countries. The family of executive board chairman Michael Otto owns the majority of the company. The company is based in Hamburg, Germany...
in 1998, the company had financing to increase its rate of expansion. By 2002, it had grown to approximately 100 locations, and over 135 locations by late 2004.
Today there are over 170 stores in the United States.
International expansion
In September 2008, Crate and Barrel opened its first location outside the United States, at Yorkdale Shopping CentreYorkdale Shopping Centre
Yorkdale Shopping Centre is a large shopping mall in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It contains over 250 stores and is located in the community of Downsview, in North York. It is the fifth largest shopping mall in Canada and also enjoys the highest sales per square foot of any mall in Canada, with...
in Toronto
Toronto
Toronto is the provincial capital of Ontario and the largest city in Canada. It is located in Southern Ontario on the northwestern shore of Lake Ontario. A relatively modern city, Toronto's history dates back to the late-18th century, when its land was first purchased by the British monarchy from...
, Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
. A new two story 35000 square feet (3,251.6 m²) building, similar to other newly opened stores in the U.S., was constructed. Future international expansion in Canada and possibly other countries is also reportedly planned. A second Canadian store, in Calgary
Calgary
Calgary is a city in the Province of Alberta, Canada. It is located in the south of the province, in an area of foothills and prairie, approximately east of the front ranges of the Canadian Rockies...
, opened in October 2009. A third Canadian store opened in Mississauga, Ontario, on October 28, 2010, at Square One Shopping Centre. The next Canadian store is expected to open in the fall of 2011 in Edmonton, Alberta at Southgate Shopping Centre and an other one in Spring 2012 at Carrefour Laval
Carrefour Laval
Carrefour Laval is a super regional mall located in Laval, Quebec, Canada at the intersection of the Laurentian Highway and Laval Freeway...
Shopping Centre in Montreal, Quebec.
In the fall of 2009, the company reported plans to open two stores in Dubai
Dubai
Dubai is a city and emirate in the United Arab Emirates . The emirate is located south of the Persian Gulf on the Arabian Peninsula and has the largest population with the second-largest land territory by area of all the emirates, after Abu Dhabi...
in 2010 via a franchise agreement with Al Tayer Group
Al Tayer Group
Al Tayer Group is a privately held holding company established in 1979 . Currently the group has operations in 12 countries in the Middle East, including around 200 stores in multiple markets in the Middle East...
.
Management
Barbara Turf, first hired in 1968, succeeded Gordon Segal as CEO of the company in May 2008. In November 2008, it was reported that sales for the prior year for the chain were $1.3 billion.Products
Crate and Barrel offers a variety of "upmarket" housewares, furniture, and related merchandise. These are displayed in the "vignette" style, where items are grouped together as they might appear in the home. The company was an innovator of this style, which has since become more widely used.Sister stores
Crate & Barrel has two sister stores. CB2 is a home furnishings division geared toward young adults created in 2000.The Land of Nod sells home furnishings and gifts for children.