Lauren was trying to explain to someone how Levitz traumatized her as a child and now she can’t even think about the place. She seemed relieved when I could describe what is horrible about the store… so here it is.
“Levitz” is a chain of furniture stores, and one of their locations is in San Leandro, across the freeway from my aunt and uncle’s house. There is a giant ellipsoid sign on a thin pole, the sign thick and imposing, like a giant wooden lollipop. From my the backyard I could see this sign, looming close by over the sound wall.
Levitz had a jingle- a small chorus of too-happy people singing “you’ll love it at LE-VTIZ!!!” in the same drug-induced perkiness you might associate with the It’s A Small World ride at Disneyland. I always imagined that all the original singers were dead, and when the jingle played, we were hearing their voices from beyond the grave. Sort of like the intense and emotionless undead lady who told you that your party had been disconnected on the old Pacific Bell analog phone system.
Anyway, I think this jingle would play on the radio, but it may have also had a local television spot, back when we had actual television stations based locally. I miss those local commercials. You damn kids.
The actual experience of going to a Levitz store is a classic example of what NOT to do in the interest of customer experience. The showroom itself is not so bad- giant, long, rooms of somewhat cheesey furniture, generally covered in scratchy synthetic fabrics… the only kind of furniture that was available to most Americans before there was Pottery Barn or IKEA. Ugly, but for the most part innocuous.
Where the Levitz store really stands out is the warehouse, where they keep all the furniture- you see, the Levitz location is laid out BACKWARDS- the warehouse is in the front. Visitors must walk through the warehouse to get to the showroom. And what a walk it is-
As opposed to the cheerfully-lit showroom, the warehouse is lit by tiny sodium lights affixed to the ceiling several stories up- giving visitors a sickly pallor in the eternal twilight. The ceiling is far overhead, and just as in a warehouse store like CostCo, the only walls visible are made of giant racks of stock, in this case ugly 1950s furniture. Something about the aisles between these walls is unsettling however… the aisles themselves are a little too wide. Not originally intended for human use.
The floor is a hard, museum-quality cement, slick and glazed. Walking down the center aisle towards the lit doorway leading to the showroom, the visitor’s footsteps echo like tapshoes. The center aisle is bordered by the giant towers of furniture, and walking towards the light is like going to see the Wizard of Oz.
In the distance a manic whirring can be heard, from something just out of sight- observant visitors might notice a metal rail running around all the furniture towers, a thin border about three inches away and six inches high. Occaisionally a huge robotic cart will burst out from behind one of the furniture towers with a roar, piloted by a hunched-over Levitz minion, skin sallow from living under sodium lamps, eyes squinting in the darkness.
The carts they drive are a combination forklift and furniture gurney, and are prevented from damaging the stock by the metal rails around the towers. They steer in a shifting pivot, I think because the entire engine complete with wheels rotates around, making their careening movement around the slick floors unsettlingly unpredictable.
The dichotomy of the warehouse and the showroom reminds me of the 1950’s adaptation of The Time Machine- perhaps itself a metaphor for the 1950’s. On the surface, brightly-lit, synthetically cheerful. On the underside, all the functional stuff- the ugly, sooty darkness that makes the cheerful world actually work. The Eloi and the Morlocks. Except at Levitz, it’s in reverse.
I think Levitz is on the verge of going out of business, or maybe just this location is closing down. While Lauren was freaking out, telling us about her horrible experiences there as a young child, our coworker Andrew (helpfully?) mentioned that his parents used to go shooting with the Levitz’s. Lauren somehow spun this into the Levitz’s as some kind of family of bloodsucking supervillains.
So let this be a lesson to all of us- store layout is an important part of brand-building.
UPDATE:
DIANE: you left out how you cannot turn a corner with some wanna be car salesman asking if he can help you and then following you through the maze. You not only feel trapped but also that you are about to be attacked.
In a cheery, perky, 1950s way I hope!