The Sears Catalog

Most people today don't remember the Sears Catalog. Think of Amazon.com, put into a book and mailed to your doorstep. Or picked up in the store. This was a 1970's version of internet buying.

If you can imagine that, the Sears Catalog had pictures and descriptions of everything you could buy in the magazine/book. It was a couple of inches thick and you could order things over the phone or by mail (US Mail, not email.)

There's a story of a company that moved a plant into Mexico. This was before outsourcing was "popular", so ignore the negative connotations associated with it in this case. The company paid their Mexican workers a small amount compared to US workers, but an ENORMOUS amount on the Mexican pay scale.

The problem they had was that many workers would quit after their first paycheck. They had never before seen that much money at one time and couldn't imagine needing more, so they just didn't show up the following day.

After much consternation, the company came up with a good idea. Next payday, with every paycheck, they gave each employee a Sears Catalog. The following day, every employee returned to work, ready to make more money and order from the Sears Catalog.

The moral of this story? I'll let you decide, either from an individual viewpoint, the viewpoint of the company or even the viewpoint from Sears. Comments are welcome.

Now where did I place that catalog....