Word: shavers
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When the Vagabond was a little shaver of five, he used to climb on his father's knee after supper and demand a story. Now, these many years later, the first ones he can recollect being told concerned a man who went to a strange country of Little Men. Or sometimes he went to a land of Big People. The man's adventures were all very fascinating and exciting...
...creation of a luxury product with an amazing consumer appeal. The prospector was Jacob Schick. Forced to lie in camp several weeks, he spent much of his time thinking up a way to make some money. Rubbing his stubby beard, he hit on the idea of a mechanical shaver. But Schick electric shavers did not appear on the market until 1931, and these first hand-made models sold at $25. Many a man began to wonder how he had got along without one. When Schicks later went on a mechanical assembly line, the price was cut to $15. Not long...
...prospector-inventor had met a promoter named Archie Moulton Andrews, had been persuaded to let him display the Schick shaver along with his own Lektrolite cigaret lighter at the Chicago world's fair. After a disagreement over distributing rights, Promoter Andrews developed his own dry shaver, the Packard, and began to sell it with noisy ballyhoo. A typical advertisement pictured a small child from behind & below, with a caption: "JUST AN IDEA OF HOW SMOOTH YOUR FACE FEELS AFTER USING A PACKARD LEKTRO-SHAVER." Jacob Schick sued Archie Andrews for infringement of his patent, but he lost...
Jacob Schick died in June 1937; Archie Andrews in June 1938. But the Schick v. Packard battle went on. Last week Schick shaved its selling price from $15 to $12.50. Packard immediately went its competitor one better by cutting its Packard Shaver from $15 to $7.50, its newer Roto-Shaver from...
...price war, this was merely revision in line with more efficient production and distribution. In May, FORTUNE estimated that for a $15 Schick Shaver, the motor costs $1 or less; the head, about 50?; case, cord and indirect labor, another $1.25; overhead, advertising and sales, perhaps another $2.50. Total costs then amount to about $5, leaving a neat $10 net for dealer and manufacturer. That Schick, first in the field, should lead in price-cutting was no surprise; that Packard, which has always been out to beard Schick, should cut further was no surprise either. Big surprise was that General...