“Business is not longer a matter of profits alone,” Penney said. “Profits must come through public confidence, and public confidence is given to any merchant in proportion to the service which he gives to the public.” As much as he focused on providing superior customer service in all of his stores, Penney also understood that service meant more than in-store courtesy. He believed that organizations such as his should be used for the betterment of society, not only because it could but because it made sense from a business point of view as well.
As he approached his later years, Penney became one of the most generous philanthropists of his time. In 1923, he established a 120,000-acre experimental faming community in Florida, which was divided into plots for down on their luck farmers. Two years later, Penney created the J.C. Penney Foundation to help fund such groups as adoption agencies, homeless shelters, youth clubs, and health clinics. He also established the $1 million Memorial Home Community, a 60-acre residential community for retired ministers and missionaries and their families.
It was not only in the company’s stores that Penney sought to increase his ability to serve the public. He dedicated much of his time and energy to giving back to his communities and encouraged store managers and associates to do the same. He wanted his employees to take an active role in their communities and participate in all of their worthwhile activities. “Business never was and never is anything but a public service,” said Penney. “We told store managers that, unless they knew their communities and unless they were prepared to enter sympathetically into community life, they could not make a success of their stores.”
The goodwill of Penney and his associates boosted the company’s reputation in the public’s eye. J.C. Penney stores were becoming known not only for their friendly and personal service, but now for their active participation in their communities. J.C. Penney stores were often so highly regarded that it was not uncommon for towns to actually petition the company to open a store in their community – a tradition that continues to live on to this day.
Penney had created such a positive image of the company in the public mind that he had in fact created a market for his products before they were even on the market. The J.C. Penney Foundation went under with the stock market crash and the depression of the 1930s, but Penney’s dedication to charity did not. After rebuilding part of his fortune, he opened the James C. Penney Foundation in 1954, which continues to address issues of community revival, world peace, and the environment today.
“A merchant who approaches business with the idea of serving the public well has nothing to fear from the competition,” Penney once said. Serving the public for Penney meant more than providing quality in-store customer service; it meant going out on the streets, into the schools, onto the fields and lending a helping hand. For it was there that the company would make the biggest difference in the lives of its customers, and there where they would be noticed the most.
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