Title

Gordon Cooke Oral History

Contributor Names

Cooke, Gordon

Ellis, Estelle (Interviewer)

Date

1986-11-05

Date Digitized

2015

Description

Executive vice president of sales and promotion for Bloomingdale's in the 1980's, Gordon Cooke, interviewed by Estelle Ellis on November 5, 1986.This interview mostly discusses Marvin Stuart Traub, president of Bloomingdales from 1969 and CEO from 1978 to 1991, who was being honored with the "One Person Makes a Difference" award at the Educational Foundation of the Fashion Industries Dinner Dance at F.I.T.

This interview takes place at a time when Bloomingdale's President Marvin S. Traub was being awarded the "Person Who Makes the Difference" award from the Fashion Institute of Technology. Gordon Cooke discusses the various ways in which Traub's style of leadership and business has made a difference in Bloomingdale's success not just as a department store but as an innovator in the world of promotions and business relations. Cooke uses Bloomingdale's country promotions as examples of Traub's creativity and insight regarding promotions. Cooke discusses the team-syle development of ideas, describing the equal value placed on promotions, design, sales, etc. as being instrumental in the creative development of Bloomingdale's. Cooke credits Bloomingale's with opening up trade with various countries before even the U.S. government had fully developed trade with these countries. Finally, Cooke talks about Traub's collaboration with both established and cutting-edge artists in advertisements and promotions.

Gordon Cooke was the Executive Vice President for Sales Promotion at Bloomingdale's throughout the 1980s, eventually leaving Bloomingdale's to work for Time Warner in 1992. While at Bloomingdale's, Cooke worked under Marvin S. Traub, who was in his final decade as the chief executive at the department store. This interview was conducted by Estelle Ellis, founder of Business, Inc., a business market research firm.

Type

Sound

Interviews

Oral histories

Subject

Fashion Institute of Technology (New York, N.Y.). Special Collections and College Archives

Bloomingdale's (Firm)

Traub, Marvin Stuart

International trade

Marketing

Neiman-Marcus

Department stores

Related Materials

Finding Aid

Rights

In Copyright

This video was produced by the Fashion Institute of Technology ("FIT") and is the property of FIT. FIT expressly prohibits the copying, displaying, or uploading to a website of any portion of this video, except for the purposes of fair use as defined in the copyright laws, without express written permission from FIT. This video has been made available online by the Fashion Institute of Technology Gladys Marcus Library strictly for research and educational purposes. If you are the copyright holder for content in this video and have any objections to this work being made available online, please notify us immediately at [email protected].

Identifier

FIT Repository ID: aod_000663

SPARC reference code: US.NNFIT.SC.FITA.3.20.4.9.3.1