THUNDER BAY - As more retail giants close their doors, former employees of one of the city’s most iconic stores gathered to remember the friendships that were formed and the customers they served for more than 75 years.
On Sunday, more than 200 former employees of the Eaton’s department store held a reunion at the Prince Arthur Hotel, something that was years in the making.
“There were groups of us that got together in the last 20 years,” said Margaret, Anderson, one of the reunion organizers. “We kept saying we had to get together, so for the 20th anniversary coming up, it seemed like a good time.”
Eaton’s first opened in downtown Port Arthur on Oct. 12, 1938. It would be a staple in the downtown north core for decades, with prominent window displays and holiday decorations.
“It was iconic for its time,” Anderson said. “It had the best customer service. You didn’t have to go looking for a cart, you didn’t have to go looking for a till. Plus the decorations, the displays, you took your kids down town to show them the windows at Christmas time.”
Eaton’s would eventually be unable to keep up with the changing economic and retail environment and the store closed in Thunder Bay on Oct. 10, 1997 before the company went bankrupt in 1999.
For Anderson, who worked at the store from 1984 to 1997 when it closed its doors for the last time, getting together not only helps revisit old memories, but also strengthens the many friendships that were made while serving the people of Thunder Bay.
“It was a social atmosphere as much as a work atmosphere and the fact that we stayed in touch for the last 20 years,” she said. “It was a time to get together and renew friendships.”
Garth Plunkett, who was the store manager from 1986 to 1992, said the Eaton’s store was like the hub of the city in its time and became a really great community store, and what made the store so great was the people who worked there.
“There are a lot of people, a lot of changes, certainly changes in retailing,” he said. “You see people who started here as students 40 years ago and now they’ve gone onto other successful careers and you see these people and where life has taken them, and that is really important.”
With the announcement earlier this month of Sears closing all its stores across Canada, those who worked in retail say there has always been changes in the way people shop, the difference now is how fast those changes are happening.
“The days or the relevancy is waning,” Plunkett said of retail stores. “It’s been happening for 25 years, but there is always change in retailing, but it’s just often been slow. Now online shopping, the days of Amazon have come along, so the big malls are in a bit of decline, but to some degree, we will always be shopping in stores.”
“I worked at Sears as well for 10 years and watched it slowly fall into the same ruts that Eaton’s fell into,” Anderson said. “Retail changed. The bottom line made a big difference on how things were done, and people started shopping differently.”
And while more stores are disappearing from downtowns across Canada, there was a lot more between the brick and mortar beyond the items on the shelves, it was the memories and the friendships that were being formed.
“You still hear people say: I miss Eaton’s,” Anderson said. “There was a lot of loyalty with our customers.”
