[2] He is best known for retail, and in April 1872, with his brother Joseph, founded department store chain Bloomingdale's Inc. on 59th Street in New York City.

[5] With Lyman as the sole proprietor,[2] the Bloomingdale brothers' new store sold a wide variety of European fashions, anchored through their own buying office in Paris.

[citation needed] His brother Joseph retired from the business on New Year's Day 1896,[2] but Lyman remained involved until his death.

[6] By 1898, the first of Jesse W. Reno’s patented "inclined elevators" (early escalators) were incorporated into the Bloomingdale Bros. store at Third Avenue and 59th Street.

[4] A benefactor to a variety of causes and cultural institutions, he was a long-term patron of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, donating several notable works[2] such as a Washington Allston painting in 1901.

[2] In 1901[5] he was a founder of the Monteflore Home Country Sanitarium for Consumptives at Bedford Station in New York,[2][4] and he focused much of his time and energy on the institution.

[5] They had five children:[2] In the early morning of July 27, 1903, Wagner cottage in New York, owned by Lyman Bloomingdale, was destroyed by fire.