David Jones celebrates 175 years

AFTER I left school in 1984 I worked as a Christmas casual in the food hall of David Jones George Street Sydney store.

David Jones

AFTER I left school in 1984 I worked as a Christmas casual in the food hall of David Jones George Street Sydney store.

This store, which was on the corner of Barrack Street, was closed not long after I worked there and was demolished to make way for a high-rise office building. But it was actually the company's very first store, having originally opened in 1838 and then been rebuilt in 1887.

I have a strong attachment to David Jones, not only because it was my first paid job but because visiting the store as a child was a major event in my otherwise small life. Whether it was to buy a new school uniform, or to visit at Christmas time to marvel at the windows and hear the staff choir, or because I once got lost in the Elizabeth Street store and spent a lovely afternoon with a sales assistant in the haberdashery department until my mother found me, some of my earliest memories are associated with David Jones.

Later this month David Jones will celebrate its 175th anniversary. It's a significant milestone for the company not only because, as the company proudly claims, it is the oldest department store in the world still trading under its original name. The anniversary is also remarkable because it's fair to say that David Jones, like most department stores around the world today, is facing the biggest challenge to its existence yet from the rise of online retail; and as a result, the store is currently undergoing a major transformation to adapt to the way people want to shop today.

Our deputy editor, Luke Slattery, interviewed David Jones chief executive Paul Zahra about his vision for what he calls "the department store of the future."

Despite my illustrious career beginnings in retail - I was promoted from smallgoods to wines and sprits on my first day - I don't claim to be an expert on department stores, but I am a loyal customer. And so it is in that spirit that we offer David Jones our top five things we think it should do to truly be a store of the future:

1. Ditch the white plastic carry bags with the too discreet use of houndstooth. Customers instantly associate the houndstooth check with David Jones and if you had chic carry bags covered in the pattern they would do your advertising for you.

2. Open a creche. The carers of young children are big online shoppers, so why not make it easier for them to visit a store? Parking spaces for people with prams are a great innovation, but that solves only half of the problem.

3. The seventh floor in your flagship Elizabeth Street store is amazing - so why is it basically empty? A cafe or restaurant up there with its views over Hyde Park would be a licence to print money. Oh, and customers would need to travel through six floors of retail to get to it!

4. Offer free WiFi. Don't worry that customers will use it to buy from online retailers once they've tried things on in your stores (if they do they were going to anyway) - it just keeps people in store longer. Don't believe us? Visit an Apple store to see how long people hang around.

5. Take it up a few notches with your Christmas decorations. How about a guest creative director each festive season?

And there's more where that came from. If you'd like to share your experiences of David Jones please do so at facebook.com/wishmagazine or email us at [e-mail].