brennan jersey - History
Foundation
The Company was founded by George Courtauld and his cousin Peter Taylor (1790-1850) in 1794 as a silk, crepe and textile business at Pebmarsh in north Essex trading as George Courtauld & Co. In 1810, his American-born son Samuel Courtauld was managing his own silk mill in Braintree, Essex.
In 1818, George Courtauld returned to America, leaving Samuel Courtauld and Taylor to expand the business now known as Courtauld & Taylor by building further mills in Halstead and Bocking. In 1825 Courtauld installed a steam engine at the Bocking mill, and then installed power looms at Halstead. His mills, however, remained heavily dependent on young female workers in 1838, over 92% of his workforce was female.
By 1850, Courtauld employed over 2,000 people in his three silk mills, and he had recruited partners including (in 1828) his brother, George Courtauld II (1802-1861) and in 1849 - fellow Unitarian social reformer Peter Alfred Taylor (1819-1891 son of Peter Taylor who died the following year). By this time, Courtauld was a very wealthy man but was also suffering from deafness. He planned to spend more time on his country estate Gosfield Hall near Halstead, but could not convince himself to retire, and continued to play an active role in the company until just before he died in March 1881.
His great nephew Samuel Courtauld (1876-1947) became chairman of the Courtauld company in 1921 but is chiefly remembered today as the founder of the Courtauld Institute of Art in London. William Julien Courtauld was also a benefactor of the arts: he gave artworks to the Essex County Council chamber at Chelmsford and the town hall at Braintree in the 1930s.
Expansion
Courtaulds had entered the market of cellulosics (viscose and acetate) in North America with the setting up of the American Viscose Corporation (AVC) in 1909. The investment in the USA was highly successful, but its sale was enforced in 1941 as part of the negotiations which preceded Lend-Lease.
Meanwhile in Europe Courtaulds expanded its cellulosics business both directly and in joint ventures, including British Cellophane.
In 1945 Courtaulds remained one of the four groups which dominated the man-made fibre industry in Europe (counting the German VGF and the Dutch AKU as one group, and including also the CTA--later merged into Rhone-Poulenc~-in France, and Snia Viscose in Italy). Courtaulds activities in continental Europe consisted in a wholly owned, one-factory viscose fibre business employing some 3,000 people in France, a 50% share in a similar business in Germany (of which the other 50% was owned by VGF, the major competitor), and a minority shareholding which controlled 20% of the voting capital in the Italian firm Snia Viscosa, also primarily a viscose fibre producer. This activity expanded until the 1960s,
brennan jersey when these products were replaced by newer developments
Post World War II
Courtaulds was one of the earliest companies in the UK to establish an economics department. In the three decades following World War II that department made notable contributions to the understanding of investment appraisal and the formulation of British - and later European - trade policy. The function also played a significant role in the development of Courtaulds from a rather sedate, man-made fibers producer to the world's largest textile manufacturer, a position the company attained in the mid-1970s. The economics department then influenced the early stages of the subsequent extensive restructuring of the company, a process that culminated in the demerging of its textile activities
brennan jersey as a separately quoted company in March 1990
Break-Up
By the late 1980s, the manufacture of clothing was quickly moving to South East Asia, and China. Courtaulds had shut many of its UK based factories and moved production to new Asian based sites but its main customer Marks and Spencer wanted better prices. Secondly, its main profit was coming from its chemicals business, which was being held back by the textiles business.
In 1990, Courtaulds plc split itself in to two parts:
Courtaulds textiles - the fibre manufacture and clothing business
Courtaulds plc - the chemicals business
brennan jersey /> Courtaulds plc
The global chemicals industry was in a distinct recession, and the company faced difficult times. The company employed 23,000 and had 2 billion ($4 billion) in annual revenue, with 30% from the United States, 40% from Europe and 15% from Asia-Pacific. CEO Sipko Huismans had focused the company on rationalisation and cost cutting: We have to cut costs. We can't count on sales growth to pay us more or to allow us to buy more of our favorite things. In 1991, the company closed its French viscose plant, allowing its other plants to boost output to 93% capacity, compared with an industry average of 75%. This enabled the share price to double in the first three years following the demerger.
Although prices were stable, the company had a potential revenue generator in Tencel, a man-made fibre Courtaulds had spent 100 million and 10 years bringing to market. Like viscose, Tencel is made from cellulose derived from dissolved wood pulp. While rayon production generates large amounts of sulfurous waste, Tencel is made with a "closed loop" chemical process in which the solvent can be filtered and reused. The final product is far stronger than rayon or cotton, which allows a huge variety of different forms and feels - from ultrasoft yet strong denim jeans, to shirts that feel like silk, to scarves that ape the texture of cashmere.
