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| Winter 2008 | Volume 82 | Issue 4 |
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Article Abstracts "Selling the American Way: The Singer Sales System in Japan, 1900-1938" From 1900 through the 1920s, Singer put in place its proven selling system in Japan, despite making remarkably little adjustment to local conditions, and with a fair degree of success. But the company was hurt in the long run, with a turning point in the early- to mid-1930s, by its refusal to adapt—as its local competitors did—to the expectations of employees and the limited means of potential customers. Singer's dramatic rise and fall in Japan reveals ways in which practices of global capitalism are simultaneously transformed and transformative as they take root in particular locales. "Inventing the U.S. Stove Industry, c.1815-1875: Making and Selling the First Universal Consumer Durable" This article examines the emergence of the American stove industry, detailing the complex interactions among changes in the product, the organization of production, and the methods of selling cast-iron heating and cooking equipment to consumers nationwide, particularly in the antebellum years. This highly competitive industry, composed of hundreds of proprietary firms, became a site of considerable innovation in marketing. Manufacturers integrated forward, controlling the sale and distribution of their goods through networks of small retailers nationwide. The article explains how and why. "Suchard and the Emergence of Traveling Salesmen in Switzerland, 1860-1920" Based on theoretical findings of the new institutional economics, this examination of the history of the Swiss chocolate company Suchard (founded in 1826) and the Verband Reisender Kaufleute der Schweiz (Association of Swiss Commercial Travelers) describes the economic significance, social image, and everyday life of traveling salesmen between 1860 and 1920. By 1900, commercial travelers formed a critical link between the enterprise and the market, helping to drive the vertical integration of production and distribution. They enjoyed high standing within the company, and many were promoted to executive levels. Traveling salesmen were largely responsible for procuring information and expanding product sales in an era that preceded specialized market research and the domination of advertising companies. "Managing Door-to-Door Sales of Vacuum Cleaners in Interwar Britain" Door-to-door selling was a key factor behind the particularly rapid interwar diffusion of vacuum cleaners among British households, relative to other "high-ticket" labor-saving appliances. Yet the door-to-door system incurred both high distribution costs and considerable controversy—owing to widespread sharp practice. Employers enticed salesmen through grossly inflated claims regarding earnings, which were in fact insufficient for most salesmen to make an acceptable living. This led many salesmen to engage in their own sharp practices—which eventually brought this form of marketing into disrepute. "'Ambassadors of Commerce'": The Commercial Traveler in British Culture, 1800-1939" This paper presents a reading of British literary representations of commercial travelers between 1800 and 1939. Three forms of representation are used: nonfiction representations by others, travelers' self-representations, and fictional representations. We find remarkable continuity in representations of commercial travelers across this long time period, particularly in terms of a sustained tension between the image of the disreputable "drummer" and the more respectable "model" salesman. These readings and findings are used to address two debates: one concerned with the timing of any transition to "modern" selling and salesmanship in Britain; and the second having to do with the processes whereby British society accommodated itself to modernity, commercialization, and the birth of a consumer society. |
Selected Book Reviews *Adobe Acrobat Reader is required to view the book reviews. If you cannot open the files,
download Adobe Acrobat here for free! Creative Capital: Georges Doriot and the Birth of Venture Capital. By Spencer E. Ante. Reviewed by Leslie Berlin. A Culture of Improvement: Technology and the Western Millennium By Robert Friedel. Reviewed by Steven W. Usselman. Tulipmania: Money, Honor, and Knowledge in the Dutch Golden Age. By Anne Goldgar. Reviewed by Deirdre McCloskey. British Business in the Formative Years of European Integration, 1945-1972. By Neil Rollings. Reviewed by Harm Schröter. The Ecology of Oil: Environment, Labor, and the Mexican Revolution, 1900-1938. By Myrna I. Santiago. Reviewed by Marcelo Bucheli. |