The Manitowoc tribune. [volume] (Manitowoc, Wis.) 1866-1878, 1877-05-24
THE SEWING MACHINE.

Effect on the Trade-Eiaornious Profits to
Be Cttrteited.
[From the New York Times.]
The expiration of the Bachelor
needle-plate patent, which takes place at
noon to-day, is expected to work impor-
ant changes in the sewing-machlne
trade, besides reducing the enormous
and artifcially prices which have
prevailed for 80 many years. The
sBachelder is the last of the series
of patents held by the Singer, Wheeler
e. Wilson, and Grover & Baker combina-
ton, which has controlled the business
and exacted royalties from outside COM
panies for long period. The old Howe
patent of 1916 for "joining two pieces
chinery,'' consisting of &C an ye-punched
needle and shuttle, was also held by the
same companies, and effeotual1y con-
trollad the manufacture of any and all
machines It expired ten years ago. In
addition to this, the combination, up to
within three years, owned the A. B.
Wilson patent for a four-motion feed,
which, with the Bachelor patent already
mentioned, gave them a practical COM
mand of the entire business. Outside
companies paid royalties of from 81 to
$3 on each machine manufactured by
them, all of which went into the pockets
of the combination. One of the outside
companies is said to have paid rs high
as $780, year in royalties for term
of ten years, and still to have made i'm
mense profits. The simple fact is that
the "margin of profit in the sewing
machine business has been SO enormous
as to allow manufacturers, agents and
canvassers q joint profit of 400 to 800
per cent. on their wares. The actual
first cost of the $50 and $40 machines
sold by the leading companies is, on the
confession of their own officers, from $11
to $15 apiece. The additional 500 per
cent. is distributed in royalties, commits
ers, taxes, Office rent, and profit to the
manufacturer The canvasser rarely
makes less than 500 on each machine
sold, and when, as in the case of the
Singer and other large companies, the
years sales are computed by hundreds
of thousands, the amount which
the "middle men" receive becomes enor-
nous. The manufacturers claim that
their own share of profit is only about
so per cent, and that a large portion of
this is swallowed ND in the maintenance of
their immense establishments, in taxes,
and in the constant and expensive Itiga-
ton which the protection of their
respective patents entails upon them. In
one case, recently pending in the courts
of Baltimore, one company is said to
have paid out $50, O0O The extent and
value of the sewing machine trade may
be gathered from the fact that the Singer
Company, which last year sold over 2O0,-
900 machines, has from $40, 900, 900 to
$15, 600, 900 invested in it's business. The
Howe Company has 100000 to
sSS, 900, 900, and the Wheeler & Wilson
and other companies have amounts in
proportion
| One of the effects of the reduction in
price consequent on the expiration of the
patents will be the material cllrtailment
of the odious "1ease'' business, which
has of late been the cause of so much
complaint on the part of the press and
public. The President of the SINCE,
Company and the Secretary of the Howe
Company stated to a Times reporter that
the "lease" business, far from being
the source of enormous profit to the
companies which it WAS popularly sup
posed to be, was much less remuneratiye
than the cash-diseount system, and in q
large proportion of cases resulted in a
positive loss. In rural districts and
among prosperous populations the
lease" method worked well enough,
but in the tenement house districts
of New York and other large cities it
was a constant source of annoyance and
| loss
Up to the present time the Singer
Company has taken the lead in the re-
ductlOn of prices, and announces that
the retail price OF it's $50 machines will
hereafter he reduced to $50 cash, and
their $40 styles to $40 cash. The other
companies will probably follow in their
wake, and most of them have made con-
siderable reductions i'll their respective
price lists. 1t is thought that this gen
eral fall in prices, while benefiting the
public, Will be the means of wedding out
the weaker companies and establish the
stronger concerns on a more profitable
basis than ever
RUSSIAN DRILL IND EOUIPMENT
As regards the armament of this huge
force Che Russian army, it is far from
uniform. The infantry has two differ
ent kinds of mrsl1ets, some corps having