Mass Production
Stetson sent a sample hat to merchants throughout the Southwest with a letter asking for a minimum order of a dozen “Boss of the Plains” hats. The hat was an immediate success: in less than a year Stetson set up a new factory in the outskirts of Philadelphia to handle his growing business. By 1886 Stetson's hat company was the largest in the world, and had mechanized the hat-making industry ("producing close to 2 million hats a year by 1906"). The Stetson Hat Co. was sold to another hat company, but these hats still bear the Stetson name with the hats being produced in St. Louis. "Today's cowboy hat has remained basically unchanged in construction and design since the first one was created in 1865 by J.B. Stetson."
Stetson also produced “dress” hats, distinguished from “western” hats by narrower brims and shorter crowns but it was his “Boss of the Plains” style hat and its many variants which fueled the company’s growth and fame.
Read more about this topic: Stetson
Famous quotes containing the words mass and/or production:
“There is a small steam engine in his brain which not only sets the cerebral mass in motion, but keeps the owner in hot water.”
—Unknown. New York Weekly Mirror (July 5, 1845)
“The problem of culture is seldom grasped correctly. The goal of a culture is not the greatest possible happiness of a people, nor is it the unhindered development of all their talents; instead, culture shows itself in the correct proportion of these developments. Its aim points beyond earthly happiness: the production of great works is the aim of culture.”
—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)