A noted downtown business owner is being remembered for his penchant for promotion and a sense of humour.
Barry Phillips died June 30 in Victoria after a long struggle with Parkinsons. He was 82.
Phillips owned Wendt & Phillips Men's Wear from 1967 to 1983 and during that time it was home to some novel sales events.
Just three years into operating the business, he and partner Del Wendt, held their 300th Birthday Sale.
"Not really," they said in small brackets in their ad in the Prince George Citizen. "It's really only our third birthday but we're to keep up with our neighbours."
The yuks did not stop there.
For $9.95, you could buy a pair of "Famous American Pants."
"Despite what our salesmen told us, our problems did not end when we bought this line. Lots of summer colours, if you don't like 'em for pants, wear 'em for pyjamas - why not, some of them look as though they were slept in."
Phillips saved many of those ads and took them with him when he and his family later moved to Victoria. They brought back some fond memories for daughter Janice Dierker.
"He wrote them himself," she said. "He had a tremendous humour side to him. As we sat there and read some of those ads from way back when, god we laughed."
Born in London, England in 1936, he moved to Canada in 1957 after a stint as a stoker in the British navy. He initially settled in Fort Frances, Ontario but then moved further west to Edmonton and then to Grande Prairie where he met Wendt through a circle of friends.
They decided to become business partners and, in 1967, they moved to Prince George where they bought Patterson's Men's Wear. By that time, Phillips was married to Yvonne Verheist and they were the parents of three children - Laurie Janice and Jim.
Prince George was coming into its own at that time. Three new pulp mills were up and operating and the city was expanding rapidly making it a ripe time to start up a retail business.
Patterson's was at 1261 Third Ave. where Nancy O's Restaurant is now located. By 1970, they had moved to 1467 Third Ave., now Evergreen Pharmacy, and had changed the store's name to Wendt & Phillips.
Wendt left in 1972, when he moved to Kelowna and opened up a store, Wendt & Hamel, with another partner. He died in 2011.
Phillips stayed put and continued with his ways.
One of his most notable innovations was the annual Cat and Dog Sale, essentially a clearance sale for formal rental wear and discontinued stock. He also hosted an ugly tie contest with the winning entry awarded a full wardrobe.
Brent Stone, a long-time employee at Wendt & Phillips, testified to Phillips' inventiveness.
"He was probably one of the first people around to have a full-price, half-price sale," said Stone, now the store manager at PG Floor Fashions.
Phillips would also let wives take suits home to their husbands without paying for them.
"They'd look at them, try them on at home and if they liked them come back and pay for them," Stone said. "Back then, that's how you did business."
Clothing was not his only venture. For awhile, he and Ron Newson, who owned Newson's Home Furnishings at Second Avenue and Victoria, ran an ice-making business, with Phillips' children delivering the ice to customers after it was made in a machine at Newson's store.
They also liked to play jokes on each other. Phillips would advertise that Newson was offering free parking at his furniture store for sales at Wendt & Phillips. Conversely, Newson once took a cat who had been living in the back of his store to the Cat and Dog Sale. A local radio personality, Don Prentice, had been in the store promoting the sale.
"I took it over and threw it on a record player that Prentice was playing and said the god-damned sign fell down," said Newson, who now lives in Kamloops.
Over the years Newson and Phillips became good friends and kept in touch.
In 1983, on "pretty much the day" his youngest son, Jim, graduated from high school Phillips sold the store to long-time employee David Close. From there, he and Yvonne, who died in 2012, moved to Victoria to live a life of semi-retirement.
"They built their dream home and bought and sold a few more businesses," Dierker said. "His greatest move was he bought and sold Robin's Parking in Victoria."
Keeping the Wendt & Phillips moniker the whole time, Close kept the store going until 2001. At the time, he cited a continued struggle to maintain a viable business in a tough economy for the closure, but looking back Close said he probably lacked the business acumen his predecessor had.
"The biggest thing with Barry is he knew what was coming up and he was in step with it, he kept up with what was going on, or not going on," said Close, who now works at Wiser Wire Rope. "He was very bright that way, exceptionally."
A celebration of life will be held in at the Uplands Golf Course in Victoria on August 25, 1:30 p.m. start.
