department store

American  

noun

1. a large retail store carrying a wide variety of merchandise and organized into various departments for sales and administrative purposes.

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department store British  

noun

1. a large shop divided into departments selling a great many kinds of goods

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Etymology

Origin of department store

An Americanism dating back to 1885–90

Example Sentences

Berkshire Hathaway purchased Baltimore’s Hochschild-Kohn department store in 1966 — it was sold three years later — through a company called Diversified Retailing that later merged with the conglomerate.

From MarketWatch

Collecting can feel like a treasure hunt, with fans combing department stores and independent shops for Jellycats when they travel overseas.

From BBC

The Beverly Hills flagship store of luxury retailer Neiman Marcus has been sold to a New York investor as the owners of the department store chain sell property to pay debts.

From Los Angeles Times

The situation also raises questions over how responsive Saks—one of America’s last remaining luxury department stores—was to complaints about Kwatra.

From The Wall Street Journal

Fallingwater, the world-famous house over a waterfall at Bear Run in the Pennsylvania woods, completed in 1935 by Frank Lloyd Wright for the Pittsburgh department store owner Edgar J. Kaufmann, meets all of the criteria.

From The Wall Street Journal

Related Words

• chain store
• discount store
• shop
• store