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Record Nr.

UNINA9910524701203321

Autore

Blaszczyk Regina Lee

Titolo

Imagining Consumers : Design and Innovation from Wedgwood to Corning / / Regina Lee Blaszczyk

Pubbl/distr/stampa

Johns Hopkins University Press

ISBN

0-8018-6193-4

Edizione

[1st ed.]

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (1 online resource (xiii, 380 pages :) : illustrations, plates)

Collana

Studies in industry and society

Disciplina

338.4/7/666/68

Soggetti

Consumers' preferences - Great Britain - History

Consumers' preferences - United States - History

Glassware industry - Great Britain - History

Glassware industry - United States - History

Ceramic tableware industry - Great Britain - History

Ceramic tableware industry - United States - History

History

Electronic books.

United States

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Note generali

Open access edition supported by the National Endowment for the Humanities / Andrew W. Mellon Foundation Humanities Open Book Program.

The text of this book is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivatives 4.0 International License

Originally published as Johns Hopkins Press in 2000

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Nota di contenuto

Cinderella Stories -- China Mania -- Beauty for a Dime -- Fiesta! -- Better Products for Better Homes -- Pyrex Pioneers -- Easier Living? -- Essay on Sources.

Sommario/riassunto

In contrast, companies that tried to stimulate desire, reshape taste, and encourage profligate spending by using the tools of persuasion - mass advertising, extravagant styling, and installment selling - found their efforts thwarted, for consumers refused to buy products that they did not really want."--Jacket.

"Imagining Consumers is the first book to tell the story of American



consumer society from the perspective of mass-market manufacturers and retailers. It relates the trials and tribulations of china and glassware producers in their contest for the hearts of working- and middle-class women, who by the 1920s made up more than 80 percent of those buying mass-manufactured goods. Following a model pioneered by Josiah Wedgwood during Great Britain's eighteenth-century industrial revolution, successful American manufacturers closely collaborated with retailers to sort out consumer priorities and tailored their products accordingly.