Hard to believe that Fletcher Jones was the largest clothing manufacturing plant in the world in the 1950s.

I don't know I have a nice Irish Thornproof tweed jacket of theirs which I thrifted.

I'm not  sure that doco was very good about some of the business side of things. Coincidence and even correlation do not made a causal link.

Sure tariffs were reduced and subsidies reduced but there wear also other factors.

My understanding is that the "worker control" of FJs worked well in times of growth and pretty good returns on investment. Until the 70's ( I'm not too sure of dates) FJs had had nothing but spectacular growth. Worker controlled businesses work well in growth and good returns. What they don''t do is work well to enable a quick responses to downturns or changes in demand or to lowering costs.

This is one reason why it didn't respond to changing times until, essentially, it was far far too late and essentially FJs was a fire sale.

It is instructive to remember what Phillip Adams said in the doco.

Adams way back, was part of Manahan Dayman and whoever - a very forward thinking and successful marketing and ad agency. Adams himself said in the doco that they surveyed FJs customer market and people, women in particular were saying that they didn't want "clothes that were stylish and lasted and lasted". What they wanted were disposal clothes to an extent because fashion was changing so fast that it was hard to justify buying the latest fashion if you have stuff that was still wearable from last year, or heavens above years ago.

This as much as the general reduction in protectionism and shift away from mercantilism that had dominated Australian business,  was a big part of FJs decline - they did not understand this market.

There was also a shift to new materials - and stretch etc away from natural wool.

FJs made  a bad move into Haggars - the full story isn't clear to me but clearly it was against their earlier models, too American and also alienated the workers - who remember were the controllers of the company.

Things changed for everyone not just FJs in the 70s.

The market for classic, stylish clothes, well tailored that lasted for years was small and shrinking.

I think it is too simple to blame "cheap overseas imports".

I do think its sad that DJs sank,that the skills were lost, that we export the best wool in the world raw, like we do minerals, and then import it back woven and made up into clothes. But thats not the fault of the rest of the world.

I also think its sad that FJs is really just a shit chain of shit clothes now that doesn't evens sell decent old school traditional clothes - they are stuck in a no mans (and womens) nowhere land.

But amidst all the regret - its important to remember that FJs virtually pioneered decent quality ready to wear clothes in Oz an in doing so and in their spectacular growth period until the 70s themselves caused the death of many, many,  small menswear outlets and lots of tailors and their skills in small and large towns and the big cities..

Change, and progress, always has winners and losers.

Last edited by fxh (2010-11-13 01:22:26)