Minutes after opening, the E.F. MacDonald Plaidland redemption centers in Manhattan are thronged with customers anxious to exchange their thumb-worn books of trading stamps for flashy new merchandise. All day long, people queue up outside, the lines snaking back a block or more. Occasionally tempers flare and Pinkerton guards try to keep order. John Walker, a MacDonald executive brought in from Chicago to help with the crush, sighs: "I go up and down this line three times a day to tell people that we are not going to close." The run on redemption centers in New York...
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