Carriage Trade

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PRAISE FOR THE WRITING OF STEPHEN BIRMINGHAM

The Auerbach Will

A New York Times Bestseller

“Has the magic word ‘bestseller' written all over it … Birmingham's narrative drive never falters and his characters are utterly convincing.” —John Barkham Reviews

“Delicious secrets—scandals, blackmail, affairs, adultery … the gossipy Uptown/Downtown milieu Birmingham knows so well.” —
Kirkus Reviews

“An engrossing family saga.” —
USA Today

“Colorful, riveting, bubbling like champagne.” —
The Philadelphia Inquirer

“Poignant and engrossing … Has all the ingredients for a bestseller.” —
Publishers Weekly

The Rest of Us

A New York Times Bestseller

“Breezy and entertaining, full of gossip and spice!” —
The Washington Post

“Rich anecdotal and dramatic material … Prime social-vaudeville entertainment.” —
Kirkus Reviews

“Wonderful stories … All are interesting and many are truly inspirational.” —
The Dallas Morning News

“Entertaining from first page to last … Those who read it will be better for the experience.” —
Chattanooga Times Free Press

“Birmingham writes with a deft pen and insightful researcher's eye.” —
The Cincinnati Enquirer

“Mixing facts, gossip, and insight … The narrative is engaging.” —
Library Journal

“Immensely readable … Told with a narrative flair certain to win many readers.” —
Publishers Weekly

The Right People

A New York Times Bestseller

“Platinum mounted … The mind boggles.” —
San Francisco Examiner

“To those who say society is dead, Stephen Birmingham offers evidence that it is alive and well.” —
Newsweek

“The games some people play … manners among the moneyed WASPs of America … The best book of its kind.” —
Look

“The beautiful people of
le beau monde
… Mrs. Adolf Spreckels with her twenty-five bathrooms … Dorothy Spreckels Munn's chinchilla bedspread … the ‘St. Grottlesex Set' of the New England prep schools, sockless in blazers … the clubs … the social sports … love and marriage—which seem to be the only aspect which might get grubbier. It's all entertaining.” —
Kirkus Reviews

“It glitters and sparkles.… You'll love
The Right People.
” —
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

“A ‘fun' book about America's snobocracy … Rich in curiosa … More entertaining than
Our Crowd
… Stephen Birmingham has done a masterly job.” —
Saturday Review

“Take a look at some of his topics: the right prep schools, the coming out party, the social rankings of the various colleges, the Junior League, the ultra-exclusive clubs, the places to live, the places to play, why the rich marry the rich, how they raise their children.… This is an ‘inside' book.” —
The Washington Star

“All the creamy people … The taboo delight of a hidden American aristocracy with all its camouflages stripped away.” —Tom Wolfe,
Chicago Sun-Times

The Wrong Kind of Money

“Fast and wonderful. Something for everyone.” —
The Cincinnati Enquirer

“Dark doings in Manhattan castles, done with juicy excess. A titillating novel that reads like a dream. Stunning.” —
Kirkus Reviews

“Birmingham … certainly keeps the pages turning. Fans will feel at home.” —
The Baltimore Sun

Carriage Trade

A Novel

Stephen Birmingham

For Beverley Gasner

And nobody but nobody else

Prologue

From
The New York Times
, August 12, 1991:

SILAS TARKINGTON, LEGENDARY RETAILING TYCOON, IS DEAD

Founder, Head of Tarkington's 5th Ave.

“He was to retailing as Carnegie was to steel, Ford to automobiles, Luce to publishing and Ruth to baseball.” So said former New York City Mayor Edward Koch when notified of his old friend's sudden death. “His death not only constitutes a deep personal loss,” the former mayor added, “it is a great loss to the City of New York and to the nation.” He was Silas Rogers Tarkington, legendary founder and chief executive officer of Tarkington's, the famed Fifth Avenue specialty store that bears his name.

Death came to the tycoon on Saturday at his country estate, Flying Horse Farm, in Old Westbury, L.I., while swimming laps in his pool. When Mr. Tarkington failed to join his wife for lunch, she went to search for him in the pool area and found him floating face downward in the water. The family physician, Dr. Henry J. Arnstein, who flew immediately to the scene by private helicopter from his office in Manhattan, pronounced death by myocardial infarction resulting from coronary occlusion. Mr. Tarkington, a trim and athletic-looking man, though small in stature, had no previous history of heart illness. “But these things can catch up with a man without warning,” Dr. Arnstein said. “He'd obviously been pushing himself harder than any of us realized.”

An Innovative Merchant

Tarkington's became the favorite New York store of fashionable women around the world as a result of a number of merchandising innovations, most of them the result of the founder's lively imagination and retailing savvy. For instance, never in its history has Tarkington's had a sale or offered any merchandise that was marked down in price. “My kind of woman”—a phrase Mr. Tarkington often used—“is not interested in looking at merchandise that has been rejected by her peers, no matter how reduced the price,” he said. As a result of this philosophy, it is the store's policy to keep no item in its inventory longer than three months. After that period, unsold merchandise, whether a $100,000 sable coat or a $100 pair of gloves, is stripped of its prestigious Tarkington's label and offered for resale to discount outlets around the country, usually at considerable financial loss to the store. At the same time, the Tarkington's shopper has always known that the goods she is buying are on the cutting edge of current high fashion.

“My land of woman would not be pleased to buy an $800 pair of Maud Frizon shoes in May and come back in October and see the same shoes marked down to $450,” Mr. Tarkington said.

“You would be astonished to learn how many retailers—and I mean highly respected retailers—offer sales and markdowns that are completely phony,” he once told a group of Harvard Business School undergraduates in a retailing seminar. “Why do so many retailers use the words ‘regularly' and ‘usually' on price tags for marked-down merchandise? Simply because if they said ‘formerly' or ‘was,' they'd be lying. ‘Regularly' and ‘usually' are used to skirt around truth-in-advertising regulations. Beware also of merchandise tagged ‘special price.' There is nothing special about the price, except that this is the price the retailer hopes to sell the item for. Every day in my newspaper, I see retail advertisements that use the phrase, You'd expect to pay. ‘You'd expect to pay $300 for a thingamabob like this.' The words are meaningless and should fool no one, but many people are nonetheless taken in by this method of creating a fictitious comparative price.”

Distinctive Advertising

As a part of its unique retailing philosophy, Tarkington's has never advertised a specific item. Instead, the store's small, discreet notices in newspapers like
The Times
and select fashion and shelter magazines say only “Tarkington's, Fifth Avenue,” thereby steadily reinforcing the store's image of quality, costliness and high fashion for a select and wealthy clientele. It is typical of Tarkington's lofty approach to merchandising that when, during her 1972 state visit to New York, Queen Elizabeth II announced that the only retail establishment she wished to visit was Tarkington's, the store refused to capitalize on the publicity generated by the royal shopper. Instead, the store referred all inquiries about the Queen's visit to Buckingham Palace.

Generous Credit Policy

At the same time, Tarkington's has long been known for its generous credit policy. “Rich people always pay their bills,” Mr. Tarkington said. “They may pay them more slowly than other people, but that is perfectly all right with us. My kind of woman travels extensively; she has homes throughout the world. She is not the sort of woman who sits down at her desk once a month and writes out checks. It's simply more convenient for her to do this once a year, or every two years, and our job is to cater to her convenience.”

As a result, when, in the 1960's, retail stores began routinely adding finance charges to all accounts unpaid within 30 days, Mr. Tarkington refused to join this trend. “My kind of woman would be insulted if I ever tacked a finance charge on her bill,” he once said. “I am in the business of serving clients, most of whom are also my friends. I am not in the habit of insulting my friends.”

For most of its history, Tarkington's neither issued nor accepted a credit card. A customer's signature on a sales slip was sufficient. Then, in 1985, the store began issuing credit cards to customers who spent more than $10,000 annually in the store. These distinctive blue-and-pink cards have become something of an American status symbol—women have been known to place them conspicuously in their wallets and billfolds—and a woman with a Tarkington's card has no trouble establishing credit anywhere in the world.

In this way Silas Tarkington built a reputation for his store, and made himself a very rich man, by catering to the very rich. At the same time, he never made public the names of his famous clientele. Unlike other upscale retailers, such as Bijan and Giorgio, the walls of whose establishments are scattered with affectionately signed photographs of celebrity customers, Mr. Tarkington's office in the store contained only one photograph—of his wife. But the caliber of Tarkington's shoppers could be judged by the sight of Mrs. C. V. Whitney, Jacqueline Onassis, or Brooke Astor stepping out of a limousine and being escorted into the store by James, Tarkington's longtime doorman.