PRINCE HELPS TRADE

Southland Times, Issue 21362, 7 April 1931, Page 8

PRINCE HELPS TRADE

DEMAND FOR STRAW HATS. During his recent visit to Panama the Prince of Wales wore a straw hat, and this fact has been widely commented upon wherever the Movietone record of the trip has been shown. Within a few days a New York firm had cabled to a London newspaper: “Please cable the name of the London firm who supplied the straw hat the Prince of Wales was wearing on his South American trip.’ This is quoted by the Daily Express as an indication of the help supplied by the Prince to British industry. Keen interest is taken abroad in every article the Prince wears, and London firms are inundated with orders for similar goods. A member of the firm who made the Prince’s “boater” states: “We won’t exactly expect cables asking us for a hat like the Prince of Wales is wearing, but we are pretty certain to receive large orders for straw hats very shortly.” It is considered that the Prince’s hat may even bring the boater back into fashion in England and revive the home sale, which is practically dead at the moment. Hatters state that the existing factories could produce all the hats necessary within a week or fifteen days. Though the straw hat trade is dead in England there is still a large export trade to the Dominions. Not only do the Prince’s hats help British trade, but large orders are also expected from firms abroad desirous of copying his shirts. The Prince’s shirt-maker, according to the Daily Express, states that his Royal Highness’s sporting shirts have proved particularly popular abroad and have already resulted in many orders. Haberdashers are equally enthusiastic. They state that until the Prince of Wales visited America a great quantity of the socks, ties and handkerchiefs now bought by America in' Britain came from France.