was to expand Soviet hard currency reserves so that the country could import more equipment for the industrialization drive. Since these goods were scarce, consumers viewed them as treasure and selling them was a huge sacrifice. Prices were kept low to entice people to participate in the Torgsin stores. These stores ran from 1930 to 1936. From 1929, the State ran commercial stores that functioned outside the rationing system. Goods were sold for higher prices than in the closed distribution stores, two to four times as much. The goods sold were regarded as higher quality than goods sold by the closed distribution stores. At the end of 1933, the first department store, called the Central Department Store, opened in Moscow. It ran until the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991 as part of the commercial store network. The end of the first rationing period and the abolition of the closed distribution system in 1935 caused the commercial store network to expand. In January 1935, there were five department stores open in the USSR. A year later, fifteen more department stores had opened. Foreign influence The import of foreign goods was extremely limited during the 1930s. The official slogan was "There is much to be learned from the example of the advanced capitalist countries in the field of consumer goods". Small amounts of foreign goods were imported, studied, and then copied. These Soviet versions of foreign consumer goods were distributed through consumption channels. The State did not directly import large quantities of consumer goods. During the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact period (1939–41), the Soviet citizens' primary interaction with the outside world was with the newly occupied borderlands of Finland, the Baltic States, Bessarabia, and Poland. Goods considered scarce in the USSR such as watches, bicycles, clothes and food products were plentiful in these regions. The occupying Red Army was fascinated with the diversity of goods at low prices. Viewed as a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to acquire them, soldiers bought large quantities of these goods to send back to their families in the USSR. This flow of goods inspired civilians to seek permission to travel to these areas to acquire the goods and sell them on the black market. 1959 American National Exhibition In the summer of 1959 the American National Exhibition was held at Sokolniki Park in Moscow. The American National Exhibition was sponsored by the American government and featured many displays of