Some sad news via Bill Bailey.
Argos axes ‘book of dreams’ catalogue after 48 years – BBC News
“The laminated book of dreams,” was how comedian Bill Bailey jokingly described the plastic-coated Argos catalogue. But 48 years on from its launch, the catalogue is finally coming to an end. The encyclopedia-like catalogues, the basis of many a child’s Christmas wishlist, will no longer be regularly printed by the end of the January 2021.
And I see that the link to the catalogues from the 70s onwards that I shared last October has gone now, too. What a shame.
Update 01/08/2020
Here’s a working link (for now, at least) to that back catalogue, via things magazine.
Miscellaneous Details 
As a foreigner I found going into Argos and looking at this weird shop with a massive book in it absolutely baffling until someone explained it to me later haha The book is like an icon of British retail isn’t it?
LikeLiked by 1 person
It really is. It wasn’t the only one though, I remember being a kid leafing through the Grattan catalogue and the Kays one (I *think* that’s what they were called, this was a l o n g time ago), which were pretty much the same. They were like a proto-Amazon, in a way – sit on your sofa, browse, fill out an order form, wait for your delivery. Sorted!
LikeLike
Sounds like a lovely memory
LikeLiked by 1 person
I was so sad when this was announced. So many fond memories circling the gifts I wanted for birthdays and Christmas. It wont ever be the same!
LikeLiked by 1 person
You’re exactly right – scrolling through web pages just isn’t the same is it?
LikeLiked by 1 person
It’s really not!
LikeLiked by 1 person
A sad day indeed.
As a child growing up in Canada, I loved browsing through the
old Woodward’s, Sears, Eaton’s and Hudson’s Bay Co. Christmas catalogues.
By the middle of the first decade of the 21st Century, all 4 of those catalogues were gone (along with two of those department store franchises in the 1990s, one closed in the past few years and only one of those department store franchises now remains).
I didn’t know there were any printed Christmas catalogues still left in the world.
And now come January 2021, another- Argos- will only remain in the bookshelves of people’s memories.
LikeLiked by 2 people
And that’s progress, they’ll say…
LikeLike