Hall and Anderson Store, Chowringhee, Calcutta, c1925

হল অ্যান্ড অ্যান্ডারসনের বিভাগীয় বিপণি, চৌরঙ্গি, কলকাতা, c১৯২৫
Hall & Anderson, a departmental store happened to be the first retail enterprise in Calcutta established by William Anderson and P. N. Hall, whose partnership started in 1894 in a humble shop in Esplanade East. Then they had moved to the old premises of Whiteway Laidlaw & Co.
Next they purchased land and buildings in the block on the corner of Chowringhee and Park Street. At first the store which Hall and Anderson built was more a conglomerate than a single shop. Numbers 8 and 10 Park Street were originally used for workshops. This whole complex was demolished in 1925 and the large building which we know today was opened in October 1925, being heralded as “the finest departmental store in India”. It had half a million square feet of floor space.
As was the case with other European retail businesses in Calcutta, they dealt only in imported or custom made goods. Hall and Anderson, in their later years, spent half the year in Europe selecting stock and came to Calcutta only for the cool season. The shop’s ads insisted that it stocked “the very latest from the English and Continental markets.” They were trend-setters in certain aspects of the retail trade. For instance, they were the first to introduce kitchenware and ironmongery as a department. Among the custom-made goods the furniture department was the most important. Hall and Anderson used good Burmese teak and Indian mahogany. Much of the initial ma¬king was subcontracted to Indian carpenters and cabinetmakers with the finishing being done in the Hall and Anderson workshops. The shop carried a large range of carpets including Indian carpets from Benares, Kashmir, Mirzapore and Ellora, as well as the usual Axminsters and Wiltons.
Hall and Anderson were quick to exploit the value payable post which, besides allowing them to trade over vast distances, also greatly reduced the risks of unpaid accounts of distant customers. Their postal department grew to be very large indeed. Orders came from all parts of India and from South-East Asia, Aden and Mesopotamia.
Hall and Anderson employed Indians but generally not as salesmen. They were, however, willing to train Bengalis and Anglo-Indians. More usually, they recruited young men from Britain, like Mr. Huggett who was in charge of the hardware and crockery department until 1946 and became manager of the store after the British partners sold the business to Sahan Lai Jajodia in that year. Source “Hall & Anderson by Christine Furedy.”
Photograph by Bourne and Sephard, c1925