Ah, Those Colonials

During that "glorious time of great too much," as Poet Leigh Hunt described an English Christmas, the groaning board of the rich and titled is customarily supplied by a unique emporium named Fortnum & Mason Ltd. Fortnum's is the world's only grocery with wall-to-wall carpeting, chandeliers and morning-coated clerks, who preside over stacks of specialty foods that can quickly run a grocery order to sky-high figures. Christmas accounts for 25% of Fortnum's business; last week 700 employees hustled to fill orders from eminent customers for such items as Beluga caviar ($44 a lb.), Stilton cheese, smoked Scotch salmon and pate de foie gras en croute, flown from Strasbourg. Almost every order includes that centerpiece of British Christmas, Fortnum's plum pudding, 70,000 of which will be sold in London or mailed around the world this year.

Not Quite So British. While all this seems quite traditional, the fact is that the Piccadilly store, dating back to 1707, is changing drastically under the direction of Garfield Weston (TIME, Oct. 26, 1962). Since the Canadian bread and grocery magnate (more than 700 stores in Britain) acquired Fortnum's in 1951, emphasis has shifted away from foods. Britain's bowler-hat and mink-coat contingent can now shop at Fortnum's for women's wear, men's clothing, leather goods, linens, even TV sets. A toy department offers miniature Rolls-Royces and hand-carved rocking horses. The gifts department has a $190 crystal champagne bucket and a $700 crocodile-skin desk set. There is also an antique department in which almost nothing is less than $1,000, and a boutique with the latest designs by St. Laurent. All of this change at first unsettled Fortnum's old customers. "It isn't that we have anything against Canadians," sighed one dowager after Weston arrived. "It's just that Fortnum's has always been so completely British."

Founded by Hugh Mason and William Fortnum, a footman to Queen Anne, the store has been, in fact, a running footnote to British history. Fortnum's supplied Wellington's officers with hams and butter during the Napoleonic Wars and shipped 250 Ibs. of concentrated beef tea to Florence Nightingale and her wounded in the Crimea. At home, Fortnum picnic hampers have always been de rigueur fare at Derby Day, Eton-Harrow cricket matches or an Oxford-Cambridge boat race. Dickens praised Fortnum's provender, and Benjamin Disraeli, after a hard day in Parliament, was met by his wife with "a pie from Fortnum and Mason's and a bottle of champagne." "My dear," he winked, "you are more like a mistress than a wife."

Bows All Around. While Weston has broadened merchandise lines, tightened operations and increased profits ($540,000 before taxes this year), he has made shrewd concessions to Fortnum's traditional atmosphere. Cash registers have been installed for the first time, but their bells are muted. A soda fountain has been added, but its decor is decidedly British and it has become a popular teatime spot for London matrons. Weston also erected a mammoth exterior clock--Britain's biggest since Big Ben went up in 1859. From it, on the hour, 4-ft. figures of Founders Fortnum and Mason emerge through bronze doors and bow to each other, seemingly happy that a Colonial has managed to change their emporium while making his own bow to them.

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