Story taught retail how to keep changing — Macy's still let it fade

Story began in 2010 as Rachel Shechtman's boutique in New York's Chelsea neighbourhood: a shop that completely reinvented itself every few months around a new theme, like a magazine you could walk through. In 2018 Macy's bought the concept and hired Shechtman as its brand experience officer.

On 10 April 2019 Macy's rolled Story out at scale: 36 shop-in-shops across 15 states, anchored by more than 7,500 square feet over two levels at Herald Square. But the reinventions never matched the original, and then the pandemic emptied the stores.

On 26 June 2020 Macy's confirmed Shechtman's exit — part of a restructuring that eliminated at least 3,900 corporate and management roles. The founder gone and the concept shuttered through the pandemic shutdowns, the experiment that was meant to teach a department store to change quietly ended.