1970sMASS MARKET PRODUCTS WITH CENTRONICS – AN OPPORTUNITY THAT CREATED AN INDUSTRYMass AppealFrom sewing machines to typewriters to its present-day categories, Brother has survived, and In the early ‘70s, Brother realized that its even thrived, during the most demanding times by national distribution channels and their seeing the handwriting on the wall and realizing relationships with major national and regional where the market, and hence the customer, was mass retailers (including Wards, Fedco, Sears going. Seeing the success of its typewriter line, and EJ Korvette) represented an opportunity management realized that real growth would to expand beyond its highly successful core happen from business machines. That’s why businesses of typewriters and sewing machines.Brother invested $3 million to buy a little-known To expand Brother’s sales and increase revenue, company called Centronics from casino giant Max Hugel went on a product expansion binge. Caesar’s World. Centronics made printers for He envisioned the Brother name emblazoned on casino machines and had developed a connection aisles of merchandise that would represent every that allowed the high-speed transfer of information consumer category.from computers to printers.In 1971, together with Centronics, Brother designed and manufactured the frst high-speed dot matrix printer, the M101, which connected to the computer via the Centronics or “parallel” THANKS TO MASS MARKETING, THE port. It helped revolutionize data processing and ultimately became the industry standard.“ ”Me DecadeAs an OEM manufacturer, Brother’s involvement DISCOVERS BROTHER…EVERYWHEREin the early days of the computer revolution YEARSprovided invaluable insights into market needs and expectations. For the next two decades, these insights would translate into award-winning The world went from seeing the moon to seeing stars, sold for “only” $2,295, weighed 20 lbs. and had printers and MFCs.as disco ushered in media meccas like Studio 54. It a whopping 2 hours of record/playback time.was as if all of America decided to live vicariously Speaking of recorders, it was the missing minutes through those in the limelight. It was this aspiration TWO DECADES = 10,000,000 SEWING SALES $on an Uher tape recorder that led to the downfall to emulate the often self-centered rich and famous of President Nixon during the Watergate scandal MACHINES WORLDWIDEthat led to the ‘70s becoming known as the “Me and that resulted in his resignation. America got the Proving the competitors who “wrote off” the Decade.” ‘70s culture focused on challenging taboos message that no one was above the law.fedgling Japanese sewing machine company through shows like Three’s Company and All in the It was also around this time that America got the wrong, Brother celebrated the ‘70s with the Family and through fashion statements like the leisure frst e-mail message (the frst SPAM message didn’t sale of its 10 millionth sewing machine. This suit (the original “business casual”).happen until decades later). The country also went was a major milestone for any manufacturer, Technology surged forward with innovations like from table tennis to TV tennis, thanks to Nolan let alone one who entered a market dominated the foppy disk – the frst portable computer storage Bushnell’s “Pong”. by “household names” like Singer.medium – and VCRs. A Betamax video recorder 21 22