They were a bit before my time. Were they essentially the same deal as today’s dollar stores with their mostly-random stock of items and dubious foodstuffs, or was their emphasis any different? I have some old arts-and-crafts books which seem to imply that dime stores were at one time a primary source for craft supplies, including some weirdly specific items such as doll furniture. “You can enhance your button garden with a miniature ceramic Chinese pagoda, such as the kind often sold in dime stores.” --The hell? Could people really be confident that their local dime store had a “tiny ceramic pagoda” display?
When I grew up (1970’s NJ) we had a Kresge’s (not 100% on the spelling) that we called “the 5 & 10.” I remember it had a lunch counter where my mother would occasionally stop with us for a patty melt and shake for lunch if my brother and I were behaving.
My memory of the products it carried is a bit sketchy, but there was definitely a craft section, among many other things. I think it was similar to a Family Dollar-type of store (but for some reason I think things were made better back then.) Get off my lawn!
There are a few of them still around. This site has pictures of some of their merchandise.
Originally, everything in a “five and dime” store was sold for either five or ten cents, thus the name. They were unlike dollar stores (everything for a dollar!) in that they had a pretty consistent inventory. They sold quite a variety of goods…everything from costume jewelry to small pets. I remember buying very small turtles from a dime store. The chain that I frequented most often did have a dedicated crafts section, where one could buy patterns, fabric, iron-on embroidery patterns, crochet or knitting kits, and a gazillion other things. I don’t remember them selling any sort of food other than snack food, and lunch counter food. These stores were a great place to browse when you’d just received your allowance, but didn’t want to spend it all at once.
Growing up in the 50’s, I do remember dime stores. Ours was Koethe’s, not a chain, locally owned. I bought my first bra there, and did my first shoplifting there too – a little paper flag, probably a party favor. I think it would have cost a penny. Why I stole it, I’ll never know. I was probably 9 or 10.
Things I bought there: paper dolls, school supplies, socks, hair doo-dads, costume jewelry, cheap perfume (Evening in Paris and Ben-Hur) and make-up, fabric and sewing stuff for home-ec, stationery, party favors (crepe paper & paper umbrellas), gum and candy. They might have stocked food and cleaning supplies like today’s Dollar Stores, but I don’t think so. I remember mom saying that they didn’t want to compete with the grocery and hardware stores.
Back in the day, when we went to town to shop, we’d have to stop at several places. Saturdays in small towns in the 50’s – it looked remarkably like street scenes from a big city.
Son of a buck! The description of the departments even mentions doll furniture and craft supplies! There’s a whole section devoted to “miniature animals and figurines!” Doggone, I bet they probably do have tiny ceramic pagodas in stock after all! What a great store.
And paper doilies and hairnets! Bobby pins! Cold cream!
I’m getting all verklempt.
And the toys were dumped in glass-walled bins on shelves, not bundled in cardboard & plastic.
There was little shoplifting back then. No need. Most people were darn well-off, & few junkies about.
Ah, General Prosperity. We won’t see that again.
There were coloring books. And those write-on tablets, the kind made of stiff cardboard with an area covered with dark wax that had a thin pale grey sheet of plastic and a thicker clear sheet of plastic over it. When you drew on the sheets with a wooden (later, plastic) stylus, it would show what you drew. Then when you lifted the plastic sheets, they went blank again. I don’t know what the real name for them is.
There were colloring books and balls and toy horses. There were kitchen towels and runners and antimassacars with embroidery patterns drawn on them. Near the cash register you could get the shaving mug soap and the de-stinky. That’s what my Dad called it. It was spray deoderant in a squeeze bottle. When my sister and I were very young, the only question for Christmas or his birthday was which of us would get him which.
That’s where I got the Fuzzy Wuzzy soap one year. It was soap shaped like a bear. You took it out of its box, wet it according to instructions, then propped it in a punchout in the box. Over the next few days it was supposed to grow hair made of the soap. I don’t remember if it ever worked like it showed on TV.
Talk about a trip down memory lane. Slinkies. Paddles with balls on an elastic band. Chinese jump ropes. Probably regular ones, too.
Kresge Corp. is alive and well, it was renaed K-Mart, in the 70’s. Here’s and art. about the founder and his connection to McCrory’s, another 5 and dime operator:
Yllaria–I remember those pads quite well! I loved them–but my big brother would always press down too hard and make a permanent gouge in the “magic eraser” sheet.
I can remember baby chicks and ducks being sold at the Ben Franklin 5 and dime near my house when I was quite small. They were sold around Easter time, to be put in baskets and then (one presumes) either left to die or got eaten by the family dog, cat or er, family. The dime store was good for candy, small trinkets, fabric (including oilcloth which is still available at my local Ace hardware), patterns, shaving mugs, cheap dishes and cutlery (ask a grandparent about S&H Green Stamps* someday–heady times!), cloth napkins and handkerchiefs, ribbon and lace trim, buttons, wrapping paper–that type of thing.
- I can’t recall just where one got the stamp booklet; but lots of business would give you stamps upon purchase of X amount of stuff. These stamps went in a book (little kids were called upon to lick them) and once the booklet was full, it could be redeemed for various merchandise. 100 stamps got you a BB gun or some such; 200 got you a toaster (totally making up the amounts and the items here) etc. That was exciting–to watch the stamps in the booklet grow.
I also remember banks giving away small appliances so you would open an account with them. In some ways, business makes more sense nowadays!
We had a drug store in our neighborhood that was the functional equivalent of the ten-cent store. (We didn’t call them dime, or five-and-dime, stores.)
The queen of the ten-cent stores was Woolworth’s. But it was downtown. Riding the bus downtown with my grandmother was a rare treat.
What I remember about Woolworth’s was the most fabulous costume jewelry rings – gigantic gaudy things, with a big central stone. The kind of thing you’d expect the Pope to wear.
Whoa, Yllaria. I remember Fuzzy Wuzzy soap!
And the lipsticks–the kind that Lucille Ball wore (or my mother) and compacts and eu de cologne… and ashtrays.
These stores usually had no A/C, but had ceiling fans and a tinny radio playing somewhere in the back.
Woolworth’s made the “5 and 10” concept viable; they started in 1878. At that point, all inventory was 5 and 10 cents, but inflation made them change their signs to “5 and 10 an up.”
In my youth, Woolworth’s was a relatively large store (though small by today’s standards), with long rows of merchandise. They also have a lunch counter. In some ways, Wal-Mart and Target have taken their place.
The concept was such that other chains and smaller stores started calling themselve “5 and 10” (we called them that instead of “five and dime”). When I was growing up there was a “5 and 10” – M.S. Grand – on our main street. It was a general store; I bought a lot of candy and most of my baseball cards there. They didn’t sell clothing, but had things like school supplies and toys. They also had Halloween costumes in October. I would assume they sold Christmas decorations, too.
The Woolworth name is no more, having morphed into, oddly enough, Foot Locker.
I remember those. I think they were called Magic Slate.
We’d also get colored chalk for that game where you drew squares on a sidewalk, tossed a pebble into a square and then had to jump the squares in a certain way and pick up the pebble. What the heck was that called? Hopscotch?
Bought skate keys at the dime store too for our clamp-on roller skates.
Nevermind–beaten to the factoid.
Duh–reload the thread before you post!
Woolworths was the place to go for big eyed paintings.
They kept the art right next to the goldfish and parakeets.
Holy cow, that’s a stone’s throw from where I grew up! How did I miss it???
I have a random memory that is telling me that those things were called “magic slates”. That always puzzled me as a kid, because I had no idea what a regular slate was.
There is one here in my small town in Massachusetts. It is Fisks General Store and had been operating since 1863. It is semi-famous in the western Boston area and very popular. Things don’t cost just cents of course but they sell small stuff that you don’t see elsewhere and it fits the spirit of the OP.