General Merchandise Company with discount stores and a mail-order operation. Thus J.C. Penney entered the mail order catalogue business. J.C. Penney, a latecomer in catalogue operations, was different from many of its competitors because it had a large retail store base before launching into the mail-order business. The first J.C. Penney catalogue was mailed the next year in 1963. Customers could order from the catalogue inside J.C. Penney stores in eight states. The J.C. Penney Catalog Distribution Center was located in Milwaukee. Catalogues through the ages Wunderman Mail order had always relied on the innovative technique of selling products directly to the consumer at appealing prices, but the term "direct marketing" was only coined in 1967, by Lester Wunderman — considered to be the father of contemporary direct marketing. He was behind the creation of the toll-free 1-800 number and numerous mail order based loyalty marketing programs including the Columbia Record Club, the magazine subscription card, and the American Express Customer Rewards program. Rise of e-commerce With the invention of the Internet, a company's website became the more usual way to order merchandise for delivery by mail. Unless the retailer provides a paper catalogue from which to order, that is if the products are mainly presented to and searched for by the customer on a web site or mobile app, the term "mail order" is rarely used to describe the ordering of goods over the Internet. It is more usual to refer to this as e-commerce or online shopping. Online shopping allows more detailed information (including audio and video) to be presented, and allows for faster ordering than by mailed form (though phone orders are also common for mail-order catalogues). Most traditional mail order companies now also sell over the Internet, in some cases with a PDF or tablet application which allows shoppers to browse an electronic catalog that resembles a paper one very closely, though by the late 2010s this has become increasingly rare, and product information is presented in a format designed for the Web and mobile apps, rather than a PDF. Rising paper, printing, and postage costs have caused some traditional catalogue merchants, such as Bloomingdale's, to suspend their printed catalogues and sell only through websites. Also, while some Internet merchants are or were also catalogue merchants, many have never had a printed catalogue. Catalogue publishing Year Mail Order Catalogues were founded Thonet brothers 1859 (GER) Royal