mail-order house

noun

1. a retail firm that conducts its business by receiving orders and shipping its merchandise through the mail and that supplies its customers with catalogs, circulars, etc.

Word History and Origins

Origin of mail-order house¹

An Americanism dating back to 1905–10

Example Sentences

These outlines were sent to the mail-order house, and they sent you shoes to fit the brown wrapping-paper feet.

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But the brown paper outlines didn’t tell the mail-order house how fat your feet were on the top.

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He manipulated boxes of chocolate soldiers until they melted in his hands and then maneuvered in ranks of twelve a set of plastic cowboys he had bought from a mail-order house under an assumed name and kept locked away from everyone’s eyes during the day.

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Possibly it goes back to the Ming dynasty—whenever that was—or possibly it was purchased from a mail-order house in Chicago.

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“I watched ’em come off the train in Yucca, and they looked like they’d just stepped out of a mail-order house catalogue.

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