Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of Bloomingdale's locations


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was   delete.  MBisanz  talk 13:42, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

List of Bloomingdale's locations
AfDs for this article: 
 * ( [ delete] ) – (View AfD) (View log)

list cruft, see Articles for deletion/List of Bloomingdales locations Caldorwards4 (talk) 01:09, 18 October 2008 (UTC)
 * G4 Delete This list is unsourced, consensus has been that store lists should be avoided. Given the last AfD in 2007 I'd say G4 applies. Ten Pound Hammer  and his otters • (Broken clamshells • Otter chirps • HELP) 01:20, 18 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Note I delisted this as a CAT:CSD due to the original afd being >1 year old. No opinion as to if it should stay or go otherwise. —  xaosflux  Talk  01:55, 18 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Lists-related deletion discussions.   -- • Gene93k (talk) 06:29, 18 October 2008 (UTC)

Merge into main article, but keep You know, I know this particular AFD isn't the best place to start this discussion, but here goes anyway. I really don't understand the intense hatred the 2 of you, Caldorwards4 and TenPoundHammer have for department store lists. I thought the both of you really cared about retail pages and wanted to do everything possible to make the articles have the best possible information. Most of the information the 2 of you like to remove is very historical in content, and cannot be found anywhere else. While I recognize that some of the lists are unsourced, many editors (myself included) have spent hours citing sources of the former locations. A good example of this was the Lord & Taylor page. Other editors like Elipongo as well as myself spent HOURS looking for sources online for that particular list. While I certainly agree this information should not warrant it's own Wikipedia page (like it is currently with this Bloomingdales list), I do think this information is relevant on the particular store page. I can also understand if a list that is particularly long (every Macys or Walmart, for example) should not be included, but with stores that have had less than say, 100 locations total, the information is very informative. People can learn a lot about these stores by viewing the information of the stores in the past.

I have frequently seen the 2 of you cite consensus on other store pages as your reasoning for deletion, but I am unable to find this consensus anywhere. Are you willing to try to develop a new consensus? Specifically, could sourced lists below a certain number (I say 100, but that's my opinion) be included due to their relevance? If you are willing to agree, I am willing to spend the next week doing nothing but finding sources for ALL of these lists. If you are not willing to develop a new consensus, can you explain why this information shouldn't be considered important to people hoping to learn more about the respective store? Some of the chains that are long gone, like Gimbels for example, are important parts of the history of department stores in America. Knowing where these locations were located, and what happened to them, is an important part of the history of the chain.

It is my opinion that these lists are a very important part of the history of each chain. I feel strongly about this, especially with locations that are no longer open. I am not as experienced with Wikipedia as the 2 of you, so I don't know what other options I have to try to keep this information available to people. But I do know we can try to develop a new consensus. If you feel this particular AFD is the wrong place to start the consensus discussion, please tell me where we should have it. PanzaM22 (talk) 18:58, 18 October 2008 (UTC)  Mike
 * You might want to read this afd from April 2007. Although I was initially in support of such lists, I've since realized that many of them are unmanagable and in many cases, unsourcable. Note that in the past, the store location list was deleted from Dillard's, and a list of JCPenney locations would be browser-crashingly long. Consensus seems to be that lists of store locations do NOT belong on Wikipedia. Bloomingdales has a lot fewer locations than most other chains, but things such as opening/closing dates seem to be pretty much unsourcable, and I don't see how these lists are really adding anything besides a big laundry list of locations. As for Gimbels, do you really think that there are enough sources out there to cite every single location? Ten Pound Hammer  and his otters • (Broken clamshells • Otter chirps • HELP) 19:18, 18 October 2008 (UTC)


 * Fry it...er delete. Seriously though, I think the issue here is not so much that the info isn't verifiable or even useful at some point, but more that it's not notable, and WP is not intended to be www.yellowpages.com. My .02. JasonDUIUC (talk) 19:20, 18 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Delete per WP:NOTDIR. Verifiable stores that are significant milestones/highlights in the chain's history or are notable landmarks belong in the main Bloomingdale's article. This list is a directory. • Gene93k (talk)


 * The both of you are missing my point, and that's why I am thinking this page was the wrong place to start this discussion. TenPoundHammer, I am not saying every single retail store should have a list. Certainly stores like Macys, JCPenney, Walmart, Ames, etc that had hundreds of locations would be hard to manage, crash browsers, and take me years to develop a source for every location.

HOWEVER...a list for chains that either have a smaller number of locations currently (like Bloomingdale's) or are closed forever and had a small number of locations (like Gimbels) would certainly give people a lot of information and perspective about how the chain grew and folded, and what happened to the former locations. The Bloomingdale's list isn't the only one I'm trying to tie this discussion to. Another Wikipedian user, SchuminWeb has been deleting dozens of lists in the last few days.

I think these lists are an important part of the history of each chain. There are thousands of lists on Wikipedia that people find useful every day. Do you know how many lists of every single episode of TV shows exist on here? You or I may think it's cruft, but to the people who want to really learn more about those TV shows, it's a valuable resource.

As for JasonDUIUC, you're also missing my point. I am willing to find sources for these lists AND in the case of the chains that are no longer open, this info isn't available at yellowpages.com or a corporate website for the chain because the chain no longer exists. It's historical information that is extremely relevant to the topics at hand.

Unfortunately, I can tell that this page is not the right place to start a consensus discussion about saving these lists. I don't know as much about Wikipedia as the rest of you, and no one seems to want to point me in the right direction for how to start a consensus discussion on what to do about these lists. That's a shame.

PanzaM22 (talk) 20:36, 18 October 2008 (UTC)  Mike
 * Delete Per WP:NOTDIR. Ecoleetage (talk) 00:33, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

The list of these store locations greatly adds to the value of the history of each chain. It explains where and how the chains grew over time, and what ended up happening to the locations in various regions. Many of the former locations of former chains are still thriving today in other use, and are open to the general public to explore and see. I certainly understand wanting these lists to be sourced, manageable (under a certain size like 100) and within the main page of each article. But I am still proposing that we compromise and keep this information, with guidelines, instead of just purging it altogether. Much of the information cannot be found all together in one place anymore, and that's what people go to an encyclopedia to do...find out information about things. I have no problem cleaning up the lists and sourcing them. Please contribute thoughts. PanzaM22 (talk) 19:30, 21 October 2008 (UTC)  Mike
 * This list does not fail WP:NOTDIR It specifically says "Wikipedia also includes reference tables and tabular information for quick reference"


 * Comment - This is only in relation to lists in general on any article, whether they be department stores or not. First, to be perfectly clear, within an article WP:N does not apply. Notability only applies to whether there should be a freestanding article. Second, just being a list does not mean it fails WP:NOT. As WP:NOTDIR points out, some lists are acceptable. As I said here regarding lists of stores in a department store article (an article I rarely edit and have provided little content to), it does not fail WP:NOTDIR. It certainly fails WP:V, but so does the entire article and I would venture at least 50% of Wikipedia in general. SO, if it is unsourced, then tag it. On a side note I disagree that much of these lists could not be sourced, as most newspapers are available on microfilm for old editions which would include openings/closings if people remember that most of the world's information is not available online and that it is not only acceptable but really preferred to use printed sources, which may not be available online (and I would expect more newspapers to become available online much as the NYT's entire collection and I believe Time magazine are now). Thus, if citations are not added, then after the usual amount of time we give, then remove the unsourced part. But, don't discriminate, tag all the unsourced bits and remove all the outstanding unsourced bits. Aboutmovies (talk) 20:39, 21 October 2008 (UTC)


 * Keep - This page and every other page that has to do with department stores. It gives me, as well as many others, valuable information about the history of the chain, and where its core markets are. If there is a source to prove the validity of the information, why should it be deleted. Nobody is making up anything. Also, there is no plagarism here, as the source is clearly given credit to. My argument is to keep these pages as long as they are sourced to prove that everything is true! —Preceding unsigned comment added by Yankeyfan315 (talk • contribs) 00:00, 22 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Delete, Wikipedia is not a directory. Stifle (talk) 08:19, 23 October 2008 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.