Elsa Felicya Gasser-Pfau (6 June 1896 – 25 August 1967) was a

Polish Polish may refer to: * Anything from or related to Poland, a country in Europe * Polish language * Polish people, people from Poland or of Polish descent * Polish chicken * Polish brothers (Mark Polish and Michael Polish, born 1970), American twin ...

-born Swiss economist. From the early 1930s, she became an advisor to

Gottlieb Duttweiler Gottlieb Duttweiler (15 August 1888 – 8 June 1962) was a Swiss businessman and politician, founder of both the Migros chain of grocery stores and the Alliance of Independents (''Landesring der Unabhängigen,'' LDU) party. Life and work Dutt ...

, the founder of the

Migros Migros () is Switzerland's largest retail company, its largest supermarket chain and largest employer. It is also one of the forty largest retailers in the world. It is structured in the form of a cooperative federation (the Federation of Migros ...

retail business. In 1948, she convinced him that the firm should introduce a self-service approach, paving the way for

Switzerland Switzerland, officially the Swiss Confederation, is a landlocked country located in west-central Europe. It is bordered by Italy to the south, France to the west, Germany to the north, and Austria and Liechtenstein to the east. Switzerland ...

's most successful supermarket chain. Today Gasser is considered to be responsible for the introduction of supermarkets in Switzerland.

Early life and education

Born in

Kraków , officially the Royal Capital City of Kraków, is the List of cities and towns in Poland, second-largest and one of the oldest cities in Poland. Situated on the Vistula River in Lesser Poland Voivodeship, the city has a population of 804,237 ...

, Poland, on 6 June 1896, Elsa Felicya Pfau was the daughter of Hersch Ber Pfau. After completing her schooling in Kraków, she moved to

Zürich Zurich (; ) is the list of cities in Switzerland, largest city in Switzerland and the capital of the canton of Zurich. It is in north-central Switzerland, at the northwestern tip of Lake Zurich. , the municipality had 448,664 inhabitants. The ...

where, after passing the

Matura or its translated terms (''mature'', ''matur'', , , , , ', ) is a Latin name for the secondary school exit exam or "maturity diploma" in various European countries, including Albania, Austria, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech ...

examination in 1915, she studied law and economics at the

University of Zurich The University of Zurich (UZH, ) is a public university, public research university in Zurich, Switzerland. It is the largest university in Switzerland, with its 28,000 enrolled students. It was founded in 1833 from the existing colleges of the ...

, earning a doctorate in political science in 1920.

Career

On graduating, Gasser worked at the Zürich Statistics Office and as a business reporter for the '' Neue Zürchner Zeitung''. From 1932, she worked for the

retail company where she became the company founder Gottlied Duttweiler's chief advisor and later a member of the company's board. It was reported that Duttweiler never made an important decision without first consulting Gasser. When in the mid-1940s she first suggested Migros should open a self-service store, he was skeptical but finally agreed. Self-service was introduced in 1946, soon representing two-thirds of the company's sales. Thanks to Gasser, Migros soon became Europe's leading retail company. She is now credited with the introduction of supermarkets into Switzerland. The Migros company also benefited from Gasser's initiative to integrate the Ex Libris book shop approach to record sales, later contributing to the company's online services. In 1953, she negotiated an exclusive contract for the supply of

record players A phonograph, later called a gramophone, and since the 1940s a record player, or more recently a turntable, is a device for the mechanical and analogue reproduction of sound. The sound vibration waveforms are recorded as corresponding phys ...

to Ex Libris with

Lenco Turntables Lenco is a brand of audio and video equipment, originally used by the Swiss turntable manufacturer Lenco Aktiengesellschaft, AG from the 1940s until the 1980s. The name is now owned by Dutch concern Commaxx International NV. The Swiss company L ...

' co founder Marie Laeng-Stucki. The order for a thousand turntables increased to 50,000 over four years and led to development of a simple, inexpensive record player, marketed at an attractive price under the name Ex Libris Junior.

Personal life

In 1924, Elsa Felicya Pfau married the judge Joseph Beat Gasser. Elsa Gasser died in Zürich on 25 August 1967.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Gasser, Elsa 1896 births 1967 deaths People from Kraków Swiss journalists Swiss women journalists Swiss economists Swiss women economists University of Zurich alumni Swiss business executives 20th-century Swiss businesswomen 20th-century Swiss businesspeople Emigrants from Congress Poland Immigrants to Switzerland