The Great A&P and the Struggle for Small Business in America
Praise forThe Great A&P and the Struggle for Small Business in America “Mr. Levinson has written an absorbing history of one company’s amazing rise—and what such success means in a nation with conflicting ideals about big business. It is more than a rich business history; it is a mirror to our own conflicting wants and visions of who and what we should be.” —The New York Times “Mr. Levinson writes engagingly, and he exhibits no overt political brief. Anyone with a common-sense grasp of business practices will find the author's points clearly and fairly presented.” —The Wall Street Journal “Levinson, who has burrowed deep in the archives, makes this story clear and compelling—and shows why A&P was both a boon to consumers and, in the words of an FDR-era federal prosecutor, ‘a gigantic blood sucker.’ Shades of Walmart?” —The Atlantic “[A] book about a by-gone era that I enjoyed wasThe Great A&P and the Struggle for Small Business in Americaby Marc Levinson. It is about the rise and fall of the A&P grocery chain, once the largest retailer in the world, with 15,000 stores, and renowned for its high quality and low prices . . . But this is more than an economic story. It is a human story about a family that dedicated itself to making its business the best it could be—and how the death of the last member of that family was followed by A&P’s decline into oblivion.” —Thomas Sowell, Rose and Milton Friedman Senior Fellow on Public Policy, Hoover Institution “[A] superb business study and an entertaining read.” —The Courier-Journal(Louisville, KY) “The fleeting nature of success in business—even for companies that revolutionized their sectors—is among the many useful lessons of this book. A&P’s legacy is apparent every time we set food in a modern grocery store, even if the company itself long ago fell victim to many of the forces it unleashed.” —The News Tribune(Tacoma, WA)“Levinson makes it read like a novel . . . A great study of responding to the need to adapt to market and economic pressures to survive.” —Booklist“This is the kind of masterful business narrative that explains both the past and the present in an illuminating new light. Marc Levinson’s highly insightful story of A&P—and its opponents—is essential reading for all those who seek to understand the love-hate relationship Americans have with the oversized consumer economy of our own day.” —Nelson Lichtenstein, author ofThe Retail Revolution: How Wal-Mart Created a Brave New World of Business“What a splendid book! The rise and fall of A&P provides a rare window into the American experience—not just the creation of the world's largest retailer but the transformation of a nation dominated by small shops and local merchants into one of massive chains, well-known brands, and aggressive discounters.The Great A&P and the Struggle for Small Business in Americashows that even the largest corporate goliaths are not immune to the insistent forces of competition and change. No one could have told this riveting tale better than Levinson—a historian, journalist, and economist—whose crisp and compelling writing makes the narrative’s rich detail always run smoothly.” —Robert J. Samuelson, columnist forNewsweekandTheWashington PostPraise forThe Box“A classic tale of trial and error, and of creative destruction.” —Virginia Postrel,The New York Times“A marvelous read for anyone who cares about how the interconnected world economy came to be.” —Neil Irwin,Washington Post