Thread Count TKO
It was around market time in fall 2000. HTT had a big story: Discount Stores Now Stocking 250-Count Sheets.
It was a big freaking deal. Luxury sheets at Kmart (Martha was the first out of the gate, natch), Target (perish the thought Kmart would out-sophisticate the "upscale discounter") and, finally, Walmart (the fat kid who always arrived last to the party).
It was around market time in spring 2001. HTT had a big story: Sferra Introduces 1,020-Count Sheets.
It was a big freaking deal. Consider that at the time discounters started putting in 250-count sheets, luxury suppliers were doing a lot of business in 350-count. Sure, they were using much better yarns and much better finishing, but all the customer saw was a number on a label. So, something over 1,000 threads? Wow!
It was around spring market 2002. HTT had a big story: 1,000-Count Sheets now Available for a $99 Retail.
It was a big freaking deal. At that time, Sferra's 1,020 sheet was tagged at $500.
I called up the sales director for the supplier who had pulled off this feat and asked him how the sheets felt. "Awful!" he said, "Like cardboard. But if a department store wants to do an endcap promotion on a 1,000-count sheet for less than $100, we can do it."
(You want a real laugh? All the afore-mentioned sheets were being sold open stock. Ah, history. It seems so ... ancient.)
That's how fast it all changed. And it's changing again - just as fast.
For the foreseeable future, cotton will rarely travel into a product unaccompanied by poly, Tencel, Dacron, Ingeo or another alternative fiber. At some point, I imagine the same bright minds who figured out how to spin yarns out of plant life and plastic bottles will be hard at work trying to do the same thing with nice, cheap dirt.
We are living in an inflationary era where the new "fabric of our lives" looks to be microfiber.
Ever since the thread-count wars exploded, suppliers and manufacturers have been searching for a path out of the insanity. Sferra ultimately launched a "Lose Count" marketing push to get out the message that thread counts had become meaningless. Mass market suppliers got behind solutions positioning for their products.
Now that 220 looks to be the new 600, except to see thread count identifications drop into obscurity on sheet packaging.
We are about to come full circle.
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Catita commented:
Tony: Ah, we parents, what rich rewdras we reap! Howard: Try saying that three times fast. Heck, I can't say it one time, slow! Easy! Ah, we pawents, what wich wewards we weap! Maggie (and Don) used to have a feature in COMIC ART and NEWFANGLES called How's That Again? which pointed out silly dialogue in comics. I remember a couple: Hendrickson from the Blackhawks: Ja, we keep our eyes and ears open for any whiff of trouble! Nukla (from the Dell superhero comic): If it were in my power, I would DESTROY all those with murder in their hearts! Those are from memory so may not be exactly correct. But back to Tony's quote, Carl Barks' Donald Duck canon contains not only scads of great quotes but many great speeches. Some of my favorites (of both) are: Scrooge (when the boys ask him how he made his fortune): I made it by being tougher than the toughies, and smarter than the smarties! And I made it SQUARE! Scrooge (on how he has fun with his money): I dive around in it like a porpoise, burrow through it like a gopher, and toss it up and let it hit me on the head! Scrooge (while being chased out of the Mines of King Solomon by a horde of wild animals): The adventures we docile ducks do have! Gyro Gearloose: Nobody can make a machine so smart that some jerk won't be too dumb to run it! Gyro (when a fortune teller offers to tell him all the answers ): You may know all the answers, sonny, but I've just discovered I could NEVER think of all the QUESTIONS! (He wouldn't do well on Jeopardy then.) Scrooge (after having had to move his money bin several times to make way for Progress): What it takes to keep out of the way of little men with their big machines is ANOTHER little man with ANOTHER big machine! Donald to Scrooge regarding the Beagle Boys' latest caper: Aw, simmer down! They can't rob you THAT OPENLY! It's against the LAW! Scrooge, describing his first love: Glittering Goldie, the Star of the North! She was spangled and flashy, and her heart was as hard as the ice on the tundra the only LIVE one I ever knew! And totally off subject Popeye: I yam what I yam! Pogo: Don't take life so serious! Nobody git out of it alive anyway! Alan Hutchinson
Oky commented:
to be down 32%, Wired is down 56%, Architectural Digest is down 47%. I doubt that with those ad declines, the page coutns are rising. If you can read the pertinent CBG info on the stand and check the website for the rest, then you92re not reading much of the magazine, as there92s not much of it online (not counting my column, which I let CBG upload each month to promote it to online visitors and encourage F+W that the audience is so large that they simply must do another book collection. [How92s that working out for you, Mr. Silver Age? Ahh, shaddup.]) Granted, the current business model of everybody giving everything away for free on the Web won92t work for long, but I don92t know if magazines will figure it out in time or not. I hope so, because I don92t want to take my laptop to the bathroom. That's as much the problem as the recession, and together they are making things tough for everyone. I92ve seen a few editors pat themselves on the back when they do huge issues, but I don92t think I92ve ever seen one editorialize about its small size. I don92t think a note of explanation is necessary for exactly the reason you note: I think everyone DID notice, and they don92t need an explanation about ad pages being down due to the recession and the Internet, ad/editorial ratios, refusal to go off the rate card, value-added incentives to entice advertisers etc. I think they92d rather Brent talk about comics in the little space he92s got. But you92re right, CBG *could* have noted its drop in page count (which could go back up at any time, unlike with a price increase). Heck, Marvel and DC always mention price increases when they occur, so CBG ought to stay in step: Dear CBG Fans: Let92s stop and rap for a moment85we owe you an explanation! First, we would like to thank you for buying this CBG magazine even though its page count is lower than usual. But the fact that you bought it is what turns us on. In keeping with our policy through the years of telling it *like it is*, we are going to level with you now. As you must know, the number of advertisers in our issues has been dropping beyond belief. Nevertheless, we have continued to hold the same price on our issues. And since CBG has been and is the symbol of only the best, we could not and would not sacrifice quality for the sake of economy. Of course, you know too well that the competition for advertisers has been spiraling up, up, and ever upward. But we here at CBG were determined not to reduce the number of pages to correspond until the moment that we absolutely had to. That moment has now come, and we must capitulate to the terrible twin tyrants97the Great Recession and the Internet92s self-destructive 93everything is free94 mentality97which has reduced our advertising and hence our editorial pages. You will notice that we have given you with this magazine superb articles for your hard-earned money97not just ordinary pages, but specially selected articles that we were planning to use at a special time85and that time is now! We are confident that you will appreciate the facts given straight, and we, in turn, promise that we will never let you down. Yours in the best in reading entertainment, Brent Frankenhoff, with special help from Carmine Infantino (as channeled by Mr. Silver Age) I realize you92re speaking from frustration because you like the mag. Trust me, everyone is upset by the declines,and they aren't as unique to CBG as I infer you saying. Brent is not a happy camper when he calls to tell me I92ve lost a page of golden words. I'm hoping I don't hear from him for awhile, but you never know. All we can do is try to use the pages we92ve got to the best that we can, and hope readers keep renewing their subscriptions and visiting the site to contribute so we can ride this thing out. Craig Shutt
maxformal commented:
Who can police thread count and or gram weight? It is a sin what is happening out there with fake thread counts.
Integrity and honesty is essential.
www.maxformal.com
"America's #1 name for Linens" since 1953
