ENGLISH PRODUCTS COVETED

Southland Times, Issue 18745, 3 December 1919, Page 5

ENGLISH PRODUCTS COVETED

UNITED STATES DEMAND THE BEST.

Travelling through the United States of Ameriva one cannot but be struck bpthe universal demand for British goods, particularly those of the highest class, which appeal to the wealthier portion of the community, writes a special correspandent of The Times Trade Supplement. This demand, coupled with the strong desire to possess the article which is stamped as costly, affords a magnificent opportunity to the British manufacturer who is in a position to export high-class goods. There is hardly a store in the best shopping streets of New York, Chicago and the larger cities which does not -stress the Engglish origin of certain of its quality goods. You remark they are high priced. “Yes,” is the immediate reply, “but you see they arc English, the very best quality.” I have discussed this with many r Americans and they all bear this out. There is hardly a man I have met up tonow who does not point with pride to some article in his possession which is English. I use the word “English" because I have heard this word used so often in comparison with the word “British.” And in addition, the thinking American is eeknly desirous of increasing trade between the two countries. He wants, and wants badly, to cultivate a real exchange of commodities rather than to see the United States exporting largely to us without our making adequate return by exporting goods of our own. AMERICAN SPENDING POWER, He points to the enormous possibilities of the United States market for English goods. A population of over 100,000,000, with a much increased buying power per head over our own, surely is a golden field. The American man or woman spends more in clothes, in jewellery, and in luxuries of all kinds than the average British man or woman. He spends more quickly and more easily. Take the case of motor-cars. The National Automobile Chamber of Comerce published a report on June 0, 1919, in which they stated the total number of motor vehicles in use at the beginnning of the war to be as follows: —Great Britain 200.000, France 100,000, Italy and Belgium 50.000, and the U.S.A. 5,000,000, or 25 times our own with a population a little more than twice ours. There are now in the U.S.A. over 6,000,000 motor vehicles. In the State of Ohio alone there are 500,000 cars, or more than twice as many as in Great Britain. Cleveland, a town of 700,000 population, possesses 71,000, or more than one to every ten persons, and makers and dealers are quite unable to meet the present demand. This surely is significant, and this is only one phase of the situation. The United States is not a pipe-smoking nation, and yet one firm has recently been in the market to buy 800,000 high-grade British pipes. The same demand exists for hats and caps, for jewellery, for lawn-mowers, and a hundred other widely differing British products. How long the demand will last if no real effort is made to supply it is a matter for conjecture, but from every point of view the British manufacturer should give very serious and immediate attention to this market. The tariff is a mental hazard, which the courageous manufacturer can play well over. He will win a worthy prize.