Housewares: the industry that isn't

THE housewares industry in the I United States is a modern economic miracle. It is vital, it is dynamic and, as its growth record of the past four decades documents, it has the strength to meet successfully the challenges of an everchanging economy.

Yet, housewares is not an official industry. "Housewares" does not appear in the Standard Industrial Clossiftcation Manual and fails, technically, to qualify officially as an industry because of its great diversity of unrelated products.

Despite this paradox, annual retail sales of housewares totaled nearly $35 billion at last count and sales of housewares products at the manufacturing level passed a record $17.5 billion mark. Manufacturers' sales were nearly three times greater than a decade earlier; and it is expected retailers' sales may well double throughout this decade as the accelerating growth of housewares continues.

Housewares is not a localized or parochial industry. Its thousands of manufacturing plants stretch from cities on the Atlantic Coast to those overlooking the Pacific Ocean, and from those along the Canadian border to cities throughout all of the South and the Sun Belt states.

Housewares is a mass production industry, eating up millions of tons of steel, rubber, wood, copper, tin, chemicals, plastics and other materials. It has created its own needs for mass distribution and mass merchandising. To serve those needs, housewares are sold in practically every type of retail outlet where homemakers shop.

Housewares are sold by mass merchandisers, department and variety stores, food and drug stores, and catalog showrooms as well as

Story at a Glance

Housewares to double before 1990. .'. semi. annual expositaon shapes in. dustry.. soft-sell benelit retailers. home centers and hardware stores. Millions of dollars worth of all kinds are sold each year through mail order, and by house-to-house salesmen, the modern version of the Yankee peddler.

The industry produces everyday products for everyday living, all loosely related to home furnishings and home improvement. Housewares constantly change and expand with new and exciting products to meet peoples' new and challenging needs. But the semiannual National Housewares Exposition staged by the National Housewares Manufacturers Association really is thought to have shaped housewares into a vital industry. Without the cohesive force of this January and July show, the disparate lot of home-use products of more than four decades ago could never have become an industry at all, according to many in the field.

In 1938, housewares buyers frst suggested to manufacturers that they conduct an annual trade show, where buyers could see and compare the industry's complete product out-

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ITLENTY of new and improved F housewares products are available for retailers to stock their shelves within the coming months, to tempt increased consumer spending which everybody looks to for turning the economy around.

Here are a few of the extraordinary, why-didn't-I-think-of-that items displayed by the 1,827 exhibitors at the 78th National Housewares Manufacturers Association International Housewares Exposition in Chicago last month. Some are strictly for fun, while others meet a real need.

Just in case you think it will take more than a few clever gadgets to turn the economy around, you will be interested in Ronald A. Fippinger's saying that the housewares industry is facing a positive turnaround period with the start of 1983.

The managing director of the National Housewares Manufacturer's Association said, "Plenty of optimism abounds despite the fact that the economy's latest recession has run longer and deeper than any since the Great Depression, and has finally caught up with housewares.

"Better than expected Christmas and year-end sales figures have put retailers in an upbeat frame of mind," he continued, "and manufacturers, retailers and wholesalers alike, closed their books on 1982 in better shape over-all than many other segments of the nation's economy in these down times."

Now, for some of the innovative products seen at the show: o A Travel Carver that combines a slicing knife, cuttingboard andcase all-in-one, with the plastic, fold-up carrying case becoming the board on which to carve. o Magnagrip magnetic accessories that include a towel bar which mounts on the side of a refrigerator, stove or other steel kitchen appliance, and has hooks on both ends for pot holders; and a similar gadget rack that has sliding hooks for adjustable spacing of various size kitchen utensils. o A travel alarm displays the exact time in any time zone you visit, while keeping track of the time back home with the flick of a switch. o Audio Visual Time is a talking clock that features simulated Westminster chimes and "His" and "Her" dual alarms.

What's new at the big Chicago housewares show?

o A pocket-size, batteryoperated electronic timer times from 100 minutes all the way down to a single second.

a Four-in-One lantern is a combination spot light, signal flash, fluorescent lantern and bug killer which can operate off batt"eries or a l2-foot cord that plugs into an automobile dashboard cigarette lighter.

o Compu-Station is a personal computer table designed for home use, with a storage module that has a lock and key for safekeeping of program tapes, manuals, disks and other computer media.

o The Itty Bitty booklight is a lamp that weighs only four ounces,

Sfo4r at a Glance

Magnetic kitchen accessories . . 4.in-1 lantern . . . talking clock. table in a bag .. battery operated scrub brush ..

n ew, d if le ren t, zany housewares displayed at International Housewares Exposition.

clips onto the back of a hard or soft cover book to flood the page with bright light that does not disturb the reader's bed partner.

o The Table in a Bag is a 3O-inchsquare slat wood table with removable legs and cross braces. The table can be rolled up to fit into its own drawstring carrying bag.

o A battery-charged, cordless Scrub Brusher can be used wet or drY for up to 30 minutes of scrubbing without recharging.

o An Every Which Way window cleaner has a telescopic handle with a 360o universal joint, so it reaches everywhere on the outside from the safety of the inside.

o Do-it-yourself, porcelain-onsteel patterned cookware assembles with a regular screwdriver. The handles, knobs, flameguards and screws come in a separate plastic bag, along with easy,le-follow instructions.

o Compucal is a full-function diet computer and five-pound scale that weighs individual portions in either U.S. or metric measure, and tells the food composition, including calories, sodium, fat and cholesterol.

o And finally, one manufacturer with a touch of whimsy is introducing an Ice Cream Cone mug and a Pepsi Soda Can mug, both of which are made of plastic but look like the real thing!