American Spectacles

Last night I returned home from a trip to find a packet addressed to me, delivered from the Royal Mail of the UK.  Patti gave me the package and said, “Now don’t you feel bad?  Someone found your Beats cords and sent them to you.”  I did feel bad, for a second.  I could see from the customs form on the outside of the package that it was an “audio cable” with a value of 16.40 UK Pounds.  That is when I knew.  This was not someone returning my cable, this was the person who I had to go online with ebay to replace the cord since no retailer carries the replacement cords.  This was just the added insult to injury.  My cords were stolen from the Virgin Atlantic security station and then my replacement (one of the only ones on ebay I could find) comes from the UK. Could there be more than coincidence? 

The return address is not clear but it appears to be:

16 Pope Close

Swindon

Wiltshire

SN254FN

United Kingdom

Last week we traveled home from a week long vacation in England.  Coming out of London’s Heathrow we went through Virgin Atlantic’s Upper Class security line.  I got picked on and picked upon.  The security people decided to search my briefcase/backpack and take out every single item and put them in bins and rerun them through and then gave it back to me to repack.  In the course of the repacking, I didn’t notice that the cables for my Dr. Dre Beats headphones didn’t come back through.  When I opened up the case on the plane, the headphones were there, the cables weren’t.  So, that put me this week trying to find a replacement cord (with microphone).  Guess what?  I checked every electronic store and they didn’t carry replacement cables, only full box set.  What to do?  I could choose to not use my headsets for a year or go to look for a replacement online?  The salesperson @ the Radio Shack on Market Street in San Francisco told me that the best thing I could do was to go online and purchase a separate cord, which would likely be stolen, but that would be the best choice.  Frustrating.  So, this morning, I went online and looked at Craigslist.  None there.  Next it was ebay and there was the cord:

So, for $34.99 I can have the cord that comes with the headset, but that this cable is made nowhere close to America.  Monster Cables, who seem to be the dominant supplier for everyone makes everything in China or Taiwan.  I did find that Cables for Less,  http://www.cablesforless.com, do “assemble” in Indiana but I still couldn’t find this cable that has the audio microphone contained as well.  I applaud Cables for Less, I just wish they were distributing into those places where we shop locally.  So, Dr. Dre beat down my buy locally and buy American. 

What we know is that the same will happen if I have to replace an ipad, an iphone, yada, yada, yada.,…

In 2007/2008 the political rhetoric was about “Main Street”.  What I liked about this was that it put an emphasis on why America’s businesses were important and particularly why our small and medium sized businesses were critical to our economy. For the past three years we still talk about “Main Street” but even in the affluent part of the country that I live in, our Main Street has been hit with empty storefronts and lost jobs.  It dawned on me earlier this year, as I bragged about the HDTV that I had bought off of Amazon for a $1000 less than I could find it in a store, and I didn’t pay any sales tax or shipping (because I am an Amazon Prime customer), that I was part of the problem, not the solution.  I have always tried to be a person who “puts his money where his mouth is” (and humbly admit that I am fortunate to be able to do this), but here I was, espousing the need for America to return to a time when it made things and one could know their retailers and the people from whom they bought, and I was doing just the opposite.  So, in the quest to be honest and authentic, I am starting a journey, an experiment, a learning.  For one full year (Jan 1, 2012 - December 30, 2012) I am committed (I am still working on Patti, my wife to make the same commitment) to only buying our durables (anything that is not perishable or consumable) from a brick and mortar retailer within 50 miles of our home and items that are made in America. Will this be hard?  It shouldn’t be, but we will see.  What I learn, I will post here and we can learn together.  Thanks for going on this journey with me and your comments and thoughts are much appreciated.