Telescope Casual Furniture • Beach Chair
The last place on earth one ever wants to buy a beach chair is at the beach. When you have a business open four months a year, markup has to cover the lean months. Naturally, being the prepared, forward-thinking individual I am, a week at a beach resort would find me in want of nothing other than food and drink.
However, a few years back, catastrophe struck. The comfortable but old chair I’d used for a decade popped its rivets, tore it’s seams, and was condemned to the rubbish barrel. To keep peace in a crowded, loud, sandy environment, I agreed to purchase a replacement.
Miles from any decent department store, we ventured into a local Everything Store to see if I’d need a payday loan to fund a replacement chair. Not surprisingly, options were limited. Plenty of cheap, flimsy imported garbage. A limited selection of sturdy but expensive domestic production. Time is money and the decision was easy. Hoy’s 5 & 10¢ would be able to pay their taxes through the winter.
For an extra $35, I could buy a sturdy, USA-made product. For the price of a couple of pizzas, I’d support a family business near the New York – Vermont border. A tradition of excellent manufacturing stretching back generations, offering employment in design, fabrication, marketing, and shipping. As well as the Five & Dime (established 1935) getting their cut.
Looking back, the purchase was an excellent decision. Six seasons have been kind to the chair, and my purchase price was about half the current list price. Buy once, cry once.
American Toolbox 