Shopgirls: The True Story of Life Behind the Counter — Season 1, Episode 1: Here Come the Girls
Documentary • 59 min • 1 season, 3 episodes • ★ 8.0/10
Episode synopsis
In the mid-19th century, shops up and down the country were owned and staffed by men, and the idea of shopping as a pleasurable experience was still a world away. As jobs opened in factories, shops lost their ready supply of young male apprentices. Groups promoted women's employment, shrugging off the notion that shop work was somehow 'unladylike'. By the turn of the century, nearly a quarter of a million women were employed in shop work. They had forged new kinds of work for women and even helped transform the experience of shopping itself. The shopgirl was here to stay.
About Shopgirls: The True Story of Life Behind the Counter
Dr Pamela Cox presents this three-part series following the journey of the shopgirl from an almost invisible figure in stark Victorian stores, to being the beating heart of modern shops.