Virginia

Sydney and Frances Lewis built Best Products into one of the country's largest catalog-showroom chains, where shoppers picked from a thick catalog and order tickets summoned jewelry, electronics, and housewares from the back. Art patrons, the Lewises commissioned the architecture firm SITE to design surreal 'de-architecture' storefronts — crumbling brick facades and a building with a peeling corner — that became pop-architecture landmarks. The catalog-showroom model faded against big-box and discount rivals, and Best liquidated in 1997.

Circuit City began as Wards Company, a Richmond TV and appliance retailer, in 1949, and grew into a leading big-box consumer-electronics chain known for its red 'plug' logo and commission sales floor. It spun off the used-car superstore CarMax in the 1990s. A series of missteps — including laying off its highest-paid sales staff during a downturn — and pressure from Best Buy and online sellers pushed it into bankruptcy, and Circuit City liquidated its stores in 2009.