The M.M. Cohn Company, more popularly known simply as MM Cohn, was a regional specialty

department store A department store is a retail establishment offering a wide range of consumer goods in different areas of the store under one roof, each area ("department") specializing in a product category. In modern major cities, the department store mad ...

chain in

Arkansas Arkansas ( ) is a landlocked state in the West South Central region of the Southern United States. It borders Missouri to the north, Tennessee and Mississippi to the east, Louisiana to the south, Texas to the southwest, and Oklahoma ...

, based in

Little Rock Little Rock is the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of municipalities in Arkansas, most populous city of the U.S. state of Arkansas. The city's population was 202,591 as of the 2020 census. The six-county Central Arkan ...

. Independently operated from its opening until 1989, the chain was purchased by The Dunlap Company of

Fort Worth, Texas Fort Worth is a city in the U.S. state of Texas and the county seat of Tarrant County, Texas, Tarrant County, covering nearly into Denton County, Texas, Denton, Johnson County, Texas, Johnson, Parker County, Texas, Parker, and Wise County, Te ...

, which operated the stores until their closure. Amid a forced liquidation of Dunlaps and its associated stores through the end of 2007, MM Cohn's remaining stores closed on September 16, 2007.

History

The namesake of its founder, Mark Matthias Cohn, the chain was founded in 1874 in

Arkadelphia, Arkansas Arkadelphia is a city in Clark County, Arkansas, United States. As of the 2020 census, the population was 10,380. The city is the county seat of Clark County. It is situated at the foothills of the Ouachita Mountains. Two universities, Hender ...

. The first Cohn store in Little Rock was at 102 Main Street near the Capitol Hotel. In 1898, Cohn moved to a store on Main Street between Third and Fourth streets. It was one of Main Street's largest, and the number of employees grew from five to 24. The downtown store was moved again in 1940 to the 75,000-SF building between Capitol and Sixth on Main that still carries the company name on its front. Also in 1898, Cohn's son, Albert Daniel Cohn, joined the company. He had been an engineer with the Army Corps of Engineers, but in 1912 he took over as president. (M.M. Cohn had another son, Victor, who died at age 19). M.M. Cohn also had two daughters, but they never became involved in the company business. Cohn's grandson, Dan Phillips, started in the business when he was very young and held nearly every position. Phillips became the one most responsible for building MM Cohn into a respected regional chain, particularly in its competition with in-town rival

Dillard's Dillard's, Inc. is an American department store chain with approximately 267 stores in 29 states and headquartered in Little Rock, Arkansas. Currently, the largest number of stores are located in Texas with 57 and Florida with 42. The company a ...

. Although he worked as a youngster, he joined the store full-time in 1951. He became president in 1969 and chairman in 1981. At its height, The M.M. Cohn Co. operated 12 stores. By the time it was sold, there were 11, because the company had closed the downtown Little Rock store. Since 1989, the chain has operated as a division of The Dunlap Company, a

privately held company A privately held company (or simply a private company) is a company whose Stock, shares and related rights or obligations are not offered for public subscription or publicly negotiated in their respective listed markets. Instead, the Private equi ...

headquartered in

. According to an ''

Arkansas Democrat-Gazette The ''Arkansas Democrat-Gazette'' is the newspaper of record in the U.S. state of Arkansas, printed in Little Rock with a northwest edition published in Lowell. It is distributed for sale in all 75 of Arkansas's counties. By virtue of one ...

'' report published on June 14, 2007, the MM Cohn stores were to be among more than 40 Dunlap-owned stores in eight states to close by the end of 2007. The liquidation followed news of Dunlaps defaulting on secured loan obligations to

Wells Fargo Wells Fargo & Company is an American multinational financial services company with a significant global presence. The company operates in 35 countries and serves over 70 million customers worldwide. It is a systemically important fi ...

Retail Finance and inability to obtain new financing. The total debt owed to Dunlaps' creditors, as indicated by a creditor's letter obtained by the newspaper for its report, totaled about $14 million.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Mm Cohn Defunct department stores based in Arkansas Retail companies established in 1874 Companies based in Little Rock, Arkansas History of Little Rock, Arkansas Retail companies disestablished in 2007 Defunct companies based in Arkansas 1874 establishments in Arkansas