Thursday, 2 September 2021
Made in England
While using my decades old retracting tape measure today, Granddaughter noticed that it says Made in England on the tape. Not something I'd noticed, but to Granddaughter it was unfamiliar and she was interested to see it. Even at eight years old she is quite aware that this kind of thing is usually made in China.
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Last year, I bought a galvanised metal watering can at a garden centre. It was made in China, and only about £15, but I was quite surprised because it was real metal of a decent thickness, with welded seams. The sort of thing that would have been made in Britain in the sixties, but given a coat of (dark green) paint, and a name like "The Criterion" or "The Nonpareil". My pleasure in finding a decent bit of solid kit so cheap (and it worked - it held water and sprinkled nicely) was mixed with sadness that we don't do this sort of thing in the UK any more.
A year later, it seems that they don't do this sort of thing in China, either. Impossible to see at first, but the "welded" seams have just been crimped over, and on the inside there is a thin strip of plastic or resin painted over the crimping to keep it waterproof. Waterproof for the first year, that is, until it all started peeling off.
Sam - yesterday we put out a banner for Granddaughter's birthday. Made in China it read
Happy Birtday.
A year or so ago a 35 year old Honda mower started to play up for the first time in its life, I traced problem to carburetor, OEM part £85, Chinese third party carb £8.75, fitted and still going strong.
Yet other items of Chinese origin have been total rubbish, a recent light fitting was actually dangerous, returned, how did that pass safety regs.
The problem is nearly everything is made in China if you look closely.
Wiggia - that's what we find. A alarm clock didn't even work out of the box so no QC. Another which looked identical but from a different supplier is fine and seems to be well made. It's as if some Chinese knock-offs are inferior copies of better quality products made by other Chinese companies.
"It all comes out of the same factory in China"; well, yes, but… it's complicated.
It may be the same factory producing the same thing with different branding. Or the same factory producing a run-on to the same design but missing the QC and some expensive components. Or a copy by the factory down the road. Something made to a specification set by a western importer who only cared about price.
It doesn't help that the concept of branding has been perverted, turned upside down. No longer a matter of putting your name on a product and thus staking your reputation for quality and probity on the product; now the brand is the product, no matter the quality sio long as it has the expensive label.
djc - yes the concept of branding has been perverted, although I wonder how long it lasts as people grow up who do not remember when the original brand was tied to a particular producer.
It's an old problem. Some large nineteenth century retailers would buy Worcester porcelain and required the Worcester trademark to be left off and replaced with the retailer's trademark.
AKH, The Worcester instance would appear to go the other way; the retailer not so much buying in the brand but buying in the quality— so good they would stake their own name on it.
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