January i, 1908.] 



THE INDIA RUBBER WORLD 



111 



The India-Rubber Trade in Great Britain. 



By Our Regular Correspondent. 



BEFORE these lines are printed the financial atmosphere 

 may have ceased to exert its baneful pressure upon busi- 

 ness operations generally, but at the time of writing it is 

 the main topic of conversation. Of course, raw rubber is not 

 the only commodity that has experienced a rapid fall in price, 

 but it is the one which has the best 

 EAW RUBBER , i,^,^ j^^ ^^^- ^g^e. Though a fall 



SITUATION. . , , . " ^ , 



in values at this season was expected 

 by the trade, nothing so sensational was looked for, and it is 

 not surprising that those who have rubber still to be delivered 

 at prices i or 2 shillings above the present market price are 

 excessively chagrined at the turn affairs have taken. And dur- 

 ing the last few weeks, when values have been declining day by 

 day, the purchaser has found great difficulty in making up his 

 mind what to do. Of course it is well known that it is the large 

 stock of rubber at Liverpool kept there by the tightness of money 

 in New York that is the main cause of the slump ; if it was 

 thought to be due to overproduction a slump would assuredly 

 have set in with regard to rubber planting shares. With respect 

 to the latter comparatively little change has taken place, not 

 that anxiety has not manifested itself, but rather from inside 

 advice to shareholders not to give way to panic and thus to 

 initiate a disastrous fall in the value of shares. The rubber 

 share market may be considered as marking time, there being 

 very little business doing. 



As far as the rubber trade generally is concerned there would 

 of course be nothing to regret if the fall in prices of the raw 

 material were the only factor in the existing situation. This is 

 not so, however, because it is evident that the recent boom in 

 trade is waning. Perusal of the share lists of motor car and 

 cycle companies shows that things are in anything but a good 

 way, and things are somewhat in extremis in the shipbuilding 

 trade on the North East coast. The bad weather of the past 

 summer is held responsible for the large decline in the sale of 

 motor tires compared with 1906, a decline which if it were 

 brought home to them would assuredly surprise those who pre- 

 dicted a large yearly increase in the demand for rubber in this 

 direction. With regard to the general question of increased 

 demand, I certainly cannot see eye to eye with those who seem 

 to think that the demand for rubber goods will show an in- 

 definite expansion in rates to the fall in price which may be 

 expected when all the plantations come into bearing. I see that 

 a writer was quoted in the November issue of this journal as 

 saying that in 1920 the yield of cultivated rubber would be about 

 75,000 tons, or more than the present total consumption. If no 

 increase in the supply of wild rubber takes place this means 

 that there will be 150,000 tons available per annum. The writer 

 of the above forecast does not foresee any difficulty in disposing 

 of this, but everybody will not share his optimism. 



Apropos of this I see that at the most recent meeting of the 

 Rubber Plantations Co., Limited, Mr. F. A. Covett gave it as 

 his opinion that the planting business was being overdone, and 

 that if more companies are brought out it will not only result 

 in such low prices as will put wild rubber out of the market, 

 but that it will also mean internecine competition between the 

 various companies resulting in loss of money all round. This 

 prophecy is by no means a wild one, though it may not prove 

 palatable to the financial groups in London engaged in exploiting 

 planting propositions. Mr. Govelt, however, is by no means 

 alone in his prognostication, and I have heard many shrewd 

 business men say that the thing is being overdone. Of course 

 no one foretells disaster in the immediate future ; it is only its 



THE MEDICAL 

 PLASTER BUSINESS. 



eventuality which is emphasized. Meanwhile there is cessation 

 of activities among the would-be substitute manufacturers. I 

 hear great things said of a new "synthetic rubber" shortly to 

 come upon the market from London, and which costs srf. per 

 pound to make. Probably the term synthetic is wrongly used, 

 but it is the fashion now to call substitutes by the higher sound- 

 ing name. 



To the best of my knowledge this branch is not carried on in 

 any of our regular rubber works, but only in works which make 

 such goods inter alia a specialty. Promi- 

 nent among such firms are Delmas, of 

 Leicester; William Mather & Co., 

 Limited, of Manchester ; and Edw-ard Taylor, of Salford, Man- 

 chester. Earlier in the history of the rubber medicated plaster 

 the fabric was sent together vvitli certain of the materials, such 

 as orris root, to the rubber factory, there to have the rubber 

 mixture calendered on the fabric. This may be done to some 

 extent at the present day, but the principal plaster factories now 

 have their own rubber plant, the main point about this which 

 invites notice being the change from the use of the calender to 

 the spreading machine. The belladonna plaster, which may be 

 taken as one of the most important, is made largely both with a 

 rubber basis and a lead soap basis. Although the former is the 

 more expensive, it has the advantage of greater adhesiveness and 

 longevity when kept in stock. It is generally sold under a two 

 years' guarantee, which is not possible in the case of the non- 

 rubber plaster owing to liability to crack if stored for any length 

 of time by the retailer. As mentioned in Mr. Pearson's book, 

 the rubber medical plaster is manufactured in the United States. 

 I have no information about the non-rubber plaster, but the fact 

 that the latter is exported to a considerable e.Ktent from Eng- 

 land to America, while very little of the former crosses the 

 water, rather indicates that the non-rubber plaster is not manu- 

 factured to any extent. In this branch there is considerable 

 variety in the textile fabric employed, some of the modern artifi- 

 cial leathers being also now in considerable favor. 



I FEEL constrained to voice a plaint made to me the other day 

 which seems to constitute a hard case. This has reference to 

 the solution made and sold for many 

 years by firms who use only fine rub- 

 ber, especially the trimmings of cut 

 sheet goods. They are now continually getting complaints, not 

 about the quality of the solution, but about its high price com- 

 pared with what is quoted elsewhere. I suppose it is a fact 

 that whereas in the old days fine rubber was generally used for 

 solution making, this is now quite the exception, cheaper brands 

 having been substituted for it. Another point is that, except in 

 special cases, the solution is not sold as containing a definite 

 percentage of rubber, under which circumstances it is an easy 

 thing for individual makers to cut the price. 



For the first time in its nine years of life the accounts of this 

 company have become public property. At the annual meet- 

 ing recently held in London, Mr. 

 THE DUNLOP Harvey du Cros, M. p.. the chairman, 



RUBBER CO. ,: , . ,. 



gave figures showing an extraordinary 

 prosperity, and it is not surprising that a report of the proceed- 

 ings loomed large in the press. [Some details from the com- 

 pany's report appear in another part of this paper.] Nor is it 

 surprising that the ordinary newspaper reader should draw the 

 conclusion that the possession of a rubber works is equivalent 

 to the possession of a high grade gold mine, but it need hardly 

 be said in this journal that figures such as given out by the 



RUBBER 

 SOLUTION. 



