Department store of Leonard Tietz AG

In 1929, a department store of Leonhard Tietz AG was built at the corner of Nürnberger Straße / Hirschstraße (GPS1). Leonhard Tietz AG was founded in 1905 by the Jewish merchant Leonhard Tietz and owned several department stores. 

Tietz opened a 25 m² small textile store in Stralsund on August 14, 1879. In 1882, a similar store followed in Elberfeld, i.e., in Germany's first major industrial center, which was also home to a large number of his suppliers. In 1884 he opened a store in Schweinfurt and in 1888 in Amberg. The store in Elberfeld soon proved too small for the closely neighboring large cities of Elberfeld and Barmen (which were united in 1929/1930 to form the city of Wuppertal ). Consequently, he realized his long-cherished wish to build a multi-sector department store on the French model in this "boomtown" of high industrialization . In 1885, the new store opened on Herzogstrasse there, and Tietz also moved the company headquarters to this location. The basis for the rapid growth of his business was the practice he introduced in the German retail trade of selling high-quality products at fixed prices with cash payment. Until then, it was customary to negotiate the price of goods in a time-consuming manner before purchase. He also gave his customers the right to exchange goods.