Younkers

Younkers, Inc.

Type	Subsidiary
Industry	Retail
Founded	1856 Keokuk, Iowa
Headquarters	Iowa, United States
Number of locations	50 (2013)
Products	Clothing, footwear, bedding, furniture, jewelry, beauty products, housewares
Parent	Proffitt's (1996–1998) Saks, Inc. (1998–2006) The Bon-Ton (2006-present)
Website	http://www.younkers.com/

Younkers is an American department store chain founded as a family-run dry goods business in 1856 in Keokuk, Iowa. The retailer has since evolved over more than 150 years to include a presence in locations throughout Iowa and bordering states in the Midwest region of the United States. It rhymes with Yonkers, New York. Younkers became influential as it acquired several rivals throughout the 20th century both inside and outside of Iowa. The chain itself was sold by the late 1990s, with ownership transferring out of state, and its Des Moines-based headquarters closed by 2003 as a part of corporate consolidation. Following its most recent sale in 2006, Younkers operates as a subsidiary of The Bon-Ton, with locations in seven Midwestern states, primarily in shopping malls. As of 2013^[update], it operates more than fifty locations in this region.

The company was founded by three Polish Jewish immigrant brothers Lipman, Samuel, and Marcus Younker, who opened a general store in Keokuk, Iowa in 1856. Herman Younker, the youngest of the brothers, opened a dry goods store in Des Moines, Iowa in 1874. Following Samuel's death in 1879, the Keokuk store was closed and the Des Moines location became the main store. The future novelist and newspaper editor Eleanor Hoyt Brainerd worked as a clerk at the Younkers store in Des Moines in 1889. In 1899 the Younker brothers' main store in downtown Des Moines was moved to 7th and Walnut Streets, and it operated at the same location for 106 years before closing on August 12, 2005. The downtown Des Moines store became known for its Tea Room restaurant, which opened in 1913 and closed shortly before the store did. It also installed Iowa's first escalator, known as the "electric stairs," in 1939. On March 30, 2014 the closed Younker's location caught fire resulting in total loss of the building.

A series of additions, enlargements, and mergers resulted in the company changing its name to Younkers Incorporated. The department store in downtown Des Moines was purchased in 1912. The company started growing in the 1920s by acquiring other department stores throughout Iowa, including Wilkins Department Stores (1923), Harris-Emery (1927), and J. Mandelbaum and Sons (1928). The Iowa-based retailers Brintnall's of Marshalltown and Davidson's of Sioux City were acquired in 1948 and Yetters of Iowa City was acquired in 1949. Younkers began expanding outside of Iowa during the 1950s and opened its first shopping mall store in Omaha, Nebraska, in 1955. (It acquired another Omaha department store, Kilpatrick's, in 1961.) By 1978 Younkers had 28 stores in five states.