Edward Nordhoff was a German immigrant who had worked for the Louvre Department Store in Paris, which competed with the Maison of Aristide Boucicaut "Au Bon Marché" (now part of the LVMH group).

[5] The Nordhoffs leased a small storefront in modern-day Belltown at 1st Avenue and Cedar Street that cost $25 per month.

They invested their entire savings account into merchandise for the store and worked to attract customers away from the city's main retail district.

Josephine Nordhoff stocked shelves, kept the books, and cleaned the store;[5] she later learned the Chinook language to wait on Native American customers.

[6] To keep customers during the economic panic of the early 1890s, the Nordhoffs stocked sacks of pennies to provide small discounts.

[4] The growing success of the store allowed the Nordhoffs to relocate closer to the business district in 1896, leasing an L-shaped building at 2nd Avenue and Pike Street.

Her new husband, Frank McDermott, joined her and Rudolph Nordhoff, Edward's brother, in operating The Bon Marché.

[11] After yet another change in corporate ownership in 1992, the Bon ended up in the hands of Federated Department Stores, a Cincinnati-based company which also owns the Macy's and Bloomingdales chains.

[13] Federated also tacked Macy's onto the names of four other regional chains under its umbrella (Burdines in Florida, Lazarus in the Midwest, Goldsmith's in Tennessee, and Rich's in the Southeast).

[14] Customers had about a year to get used to that change when, in September 2004, Federated announced that all its regional chains would be renamed Macy's.

On February 6, 2008, Terry Lundgren announced the localization strategy and the company's plan to shed 2,550 jobs.

[16] Beginning in the 1990s, The Bon Marché used an advertising jingle for its "One Day Sale" based on the song "Day-O" by Harry Belafonte.