What do you miss about department stores that have changed or disappeared over the years?

KMart, Woolwooth’s, and Two Guys were frequent family shopping grounds during my childhood.  KMart is the only remaining store since Wal-Mart’s monopoly takeover.  I remember the days of blue light specials, when bargain hunting was an adventure.  I recall Mel’s Diner-type waitresses serving greasy spoon specials at the family-style restaurants within the walls of KMart and Woolworth’s.

For many years my hard-working mom brought home countless stories and frustrations of making a living in retail.  As a child, I would scrape together change in order to take public transit from home to the store. I loved hanging out where my mom worked, window-shopping, and putting stuff on layaway (stuff I would most likely never pay for in full).  Thanks to the store’s endlessly looping background music, I have embedded in me a huge repertoire of 80’s music – mostly from the best of Heart.

Some of my most treasured childhood possessions came from department stores—I associate having owned them with the process of saving up allowances, begging my mom to take me to the store in her Toyota 2-door Tercel, and carefully selecting the desired possession.

Perhaps these department store memories are associated with other familiar experiences, but for some reason, I no longer view chain-store shopping in the same regard.  As an adult, I find the task to be more of a frustration than a joy.

Are there any departmet store experiences from your childhood that you remember fondly?  What specific experiences do you miss?  Do you wish modern-day department stores would recapture some of those former ways, or are satisfied with how things have changed?