Business Review of 1907, Peirce Specialty Company growth has been unparalleled

BUSINESS OF THE YEAR 1907 IN REVIEW.

Even with the check due to the financial depression of the last quarter, the electrical business of the United States for the year 1907 was very large. The uneasiness that was first manifested on a wide scale in October has passed away largely in electrical circles, and the year 1908 is faced with confidence. However, the year brought its own vicissitudes, as everybody knows, and for that reason the subjoined letters reviewing the business situation will be read with more than usual interest.

·

·

Peirce Specialty Company, Elkhart, Ind. (C. L. Peirce, Jr., president) : In reviewing the various features of our business for the year just closed, the most interesting deduction, and the one most clearly set forth by the development of our business, has been the widespread adoption of better outside construction specifications. A movement to end has, of course, been on foot for many years. We have all of us preached the doctrine of better first construction, with a view of a lower rate of depreciation and a decreased cost of maintenance. Some of the larger companies were quick to adopt new methods, but in the field generally throughout the country all the preaching which has been done on this subject has borne but little fruit until the last three years, and the year 1907 seems to have culminated in a very general acceptance of the principles set forth. This movement, of course means much for each company taking part in it, but for the industry at large it means still more, as it betokens a generally healthy condition, which augurs well for the investor, both present and future, and will do much toward increasing the stability of the operating company securities. The actual growth in our sales of construction specialties for 1907 over those of 1906 was 42 per cent., as against a growth of 61 per cent. of 1906 over 1905. In money value, therefore, our percentage of growth in 1907 is not as great in 1906, but in the number of new accounts or new companies adopting our steel specialties the 1907 growth has been unparalleled, the explanation of the lessened percentage in money value being that teh adoption during 1906 was very largely among the larger companies of the country, and ran into large sales, and the new companies adopting the material during 1907 were very largely confined to the plants in the smaller cities.

·

·