Harold Roitenberg (January 7, 1927 – December 20, 2018) was an American businessman who founded the catalog merchandiser and showroom Modern Merchandising Inc.

Biography

Roitenberg was born to a

Jewish Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

family, the son of Sarah and Norman Roitenberg. Roitenberg graduated with a B.A. in Journalism from the

University of Minnesota The University of Minnesota, formally the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, (UMN Twin Cities, the U of M, or Minnesota) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul, Tw ...

. After school, he worked in the advertising department of Northwestern Auto Parts in Minneapolis and then went to work for his father-in-law who owned Minnesota Wholesalers which sold horse supplies. During his tenure, he expanded the company into a

catalog showroom A catalog merchant (catalogue merchant in British and Canadian English) is a form of retailing. The typical merchant sells a wide variety of household and personal products, with many emphasizing jewelry. Unlike a self-serve retail store, most ...

business that also sold small appliances, housewares, electronics, and jewelry. Upon his father-in-law's death, Roitenberg was unable to obtain a satisfactory equity interest in the company and ventured out on his own founding Creative Merchandising & Publishing in 1960. As he had little in the way of resources, he could not support his own showroom so he instead developed a new business model which focused on producing catalogs for small businesses who wanted to develop a catalog presence but did not have the expertise, resources, and buying power to secure lower prices from manufacturers. Roitenberg's company allowed them to purchase collectively and secure lower prices. In 1961, he changed the name to Modern Merchandising Inc. Due to its origin as a catalog publisher, Modern Merchandising published its own catalog along with that of competitors

Service Merchandise Service Merchandise was a retail chain of catalog showrooms carrying jewelry, toys, sporting goods, and electronics. The company, which first began in 1934 as a five-and-dime store, was in existence for 68 years before ceasing operations in 2002. ...

(founded by

Harry Zimmerman Harry may refer to: TV shows * ''Harry'' (American TV series), a 1987 American comedy series starring Alan Arkin * ''Harry'' (British TV series), a 1993 BBC drama that ran for two seasons * ''Harry'' (talk show), a 2016 American daytime talk show ...

) and

Best Products Best Products Company, Inc., or simply Best, was a chain of American catalog showroom retail stores founded by Sydney and Frances Lewis in 1957 and formerly headquartered in Richmond, Virginia. The company was in existence for four decades befor ...

(founded by Sydney Lewis); the three companies (whose owners were friends) had regional non-compete agreements with each other. In 1982, Modern Merchandising, then the 3rd largest catalog retailer, was acquired by

in a stock transaction worth $109 million. The merger was accretive as Best Products' showrooms were mainly on the East Coast, Texas, and California while Modern Merchandising was mostly in the Midwest and Northwest.

Personal life

Roitenberg had five children: Steven Roitenberg, David Roitenberg, Sam Roitenberg, Jane Roitenberg Nolen, and Ursula Roitenber Galanos. All his sons predeceased him. Roitenberg was a victim of

Bernard Madoff Bernard Lawrence Madoff ( ; April 29, 1938April 14, 2021) was an American fraudster and financier who was the admitted mastermind of the largest Ponzi scheme in history, worth about $64.8 billion. He was at one time chairman of the NASDAQ s ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Roitenberg, Harold 1927 births 2018 deaths 20th-century American Jews 20th-century American businesspeople American company founders University of Minnesota School of Journalism and Mass Communication alumni 20th-century American philanthropists 21st-century American Jews