One Size Fits All- The Swanndri Success Story

The warm woolly swannie is a New Zealand legend. It's right up there with number eight wire, bits of baling twine, big barking huntaway dogs and Colin Meads.

It's a tough, weather proof and stylish garment just right for the farm and the footy.

All sorts of people have owned a Swanndri and the originals were made right here in Taranaki. This week's story tells you more.

Rewind

Henry William Broome was the Swanndri man. He saw a need for them way back in 1913.

Decide whether the events below also happened in the same year and check your answers at the end of this week's TreasureLink.

True or false?

1. The first heavy truck on New Zealand roads begins to transport goods.
2. The first woman passenger flies in an aircraft in New Zealand.
3. Arrows are still on prison clothing and will be for another 10 years.
4. New Zealand's first ski club is formed.
5. Housewives around New Zealand form a union.

Word watch

All the words and phrases below are in this week's story. Choose the best meaning and check again when you read the story. The answers are at the end of this week's TreasureLink.

1. dapper (a) extremely honest  or (b) very stylish in the way they dress
2. mercer (a) a dealer in textiles or (b) a tailor
3. immigrant (a) a person that leaves one country to settle permanently in another or (b) a refugee
4. perused (a)  studied history or (b)  read or examined often with great care
5. annals of time (a) a record of events over a period or (b) a lifetime's journey
6. a canny salesman (a) a highly successful salesman or (b) a careful and shrewd salesman
7. innovative (a) clever or (b) creative
8. royalties (a) income or earnings or (b) top of the range items of clothing
9. benefactors (a) people that give aid- often money or (b) those that benefit from the actions of others
10. ubiquitous (a)very popular or (b) seeming to be everywhere at the same time

What's a swannie then?

The original Swanndri was a bush shirt but there are all sorts of Swanndri items today.

Check them all out at this swannie shop and build your swannie knowledge at the same time.

Find out these things:

1. Can people still buy bush shirts just like the original ones?
2. Is the Swanndri still "one size fits all"?
3. Is there a Swanndri product today that isn't made from wool?
4. Which of the Swanndri products uses a special high tech liner that wasn't around in William Henry Broome's day?
5. What is the traditional swannie pattern on the fabric?

Who needs a Swannie?

The very first Swanndris were made for farmers and bushmen. William Henry Broome thought they needed a better garment to keep warm and dry.

Check out this Kiwi Careers site and find five jobs where a swannie would be incredibly handy.

Combine your list with a classmate's list. What if you had three swannies to give away? Which three jobs deserve a Swanndri the most?

William the businessman

The first three parts of this week's story tell you about William Broome the Swanndri inventor and his grandson Bob.

William arrived in New Zealand when he was 21 and his business thrived. He was an enterprising fellow.

Read through to A gap in the market and find some evidence to show William had each of the enterprising qualities below.

William did these things:

1. He looked for opportunities. Evidence?
2. He worked with others and in teams. Evidence?
3. He planned and organised. Evidence?
4. He communicated ideas. Evidence?
5. He took careful risks. Evidence?

A gap in the market

A gap in the market happens when people need a product that isn't there. For example a gap in the market appeared before mobile phones were invented.

All phone calls were from home, work or a phone box. People were linked to their land lines by wires but mobiles changed all that and the gap was filled.

Read A gap in the market to find out about the gap that William Broome found.

What if William surveyed his customers like many businesses do today?

Team up with a classmate and design a customer's survey form that could have given William the information he needed before he made his Swanndris.

Keep your form simple so that his customers only have to tick the boxes. Keep it short too. People don't like doing long surveys!

A secret formula

Read A secret formula now and find out where William found the formula to waterproof his Swanndris.

Look here for the natural characteristics that make wool so special. Scroll down until you get to "fibre absorbency" and find out why William had a head start when it came to waterproofing his woollen Swanndris.

Why call them Swanndris?

Read Bowler and Broome now. The story doesn't tell us why the famous bush shirts were called Swanndris but it probably has something to do with the expression, "Like water off a duck's back".

Have you ever noticed how ducks never look wet? They can swim under a waterfall and come out looking the same as when they went in.

Look here to find out why. It has nothing to do with a secret chemical coating.

Why then did William Broome call his shirts Swanndri? Think, pair and share your ideas with a classmate.

What made the swannie waterproof?

Read all about The special Swanndri treatment and take special note of how these shirts were shrunk and waterproofed.

Study these woolly facts with a classmate and then answer the question below.

1. Wool can absorb moisture. It often seems dry even though it is holding water.
2. Moisture can be released out of the wool fibre through the cells. This "hydration energy" makes us feel warm even if our woollen garment is wet.
3. Microscopes show that a wool fibre has:
         - an outer layer of scales called the cuticle, making the fibres interlock when they are used to make a garment;
         - an inside core like a tiny cable, called the cortex, giving strength.
   In between these two layers are thousands of little sealed-in air bubbles.  These help make the the wool heat proof, cold proof and and damp proof.

Question: The three reasons below probably all helped waterproof the Swannie but which reason do you think helped the most?

(a) The natural qualities of the wool fibres
(b) The shrinking process
(c) The secret formula

Swanndris three at a time

The story tells us that woollen material was difficult to get during the war because it was needed for uniforms.

That's why the Swanndris were bundled up for sale three at a time. Look here and scan the article to find out how many men and women were sent overseas during World War 11. It's a lot of uniforms.

A canny salesman

Read this part of the story now and then team up with a classmate to work out another  great advertising idea to help sell the classic Swanndri today.

William Broome's ideas showed his audience how weatherproof and tough the Swanndris were then. Your ad should display the same qualities to a television audience today.

New owners for the Swannie company

Read The business changes hands and McKendrick, a charitable man and take special note of how the process of making a Swannie changed.

What does this part of the story tell us:

 The secret chemical was once an    important part in the waterproofing or…
The secret chemical never really played a big part in the waterproofing.

A Swannie for everyone!

Finish the story now and find out about the New Zealand city that tried to claim the Swanndri as their own.

Find out too about the most popular Swannie and how many are still sold each year.

Swanndri New Zealand paid millions of dollars for the Swanndri brand. Why didn't they just start a new brand and give their company a different name? Would you have bought  the Swanndri brand if you were the managing director?

Think, pair and then share your ideas with a classmate.

Fast forward to 2005 - Closing the factory

Waitara had the Swanndri factory once and all the jobs that went with it. Alliance Textiles (NZ) bought the brand in 1975 and Swannies were made in Timaru.

When Swanndri New Zealand  took over in July 2004 the Timaru workers still had their jobs but by 2006 the Swanndri clothes will have another label - "Made in China" The Timaru factory will close.

Many clothing companies in New Zealand have closed down in recent years. It's much cheaper to import clothes from overseas than make them here.

Swanndri New Zealand wanted to stay in Timaru but good business sense told them they were better off in China.

Clothes made in other countries once had big import taxes put on them so most New Zealanders wore "New Zealand Made." You could buy clothes from overseas but you paid a lot more.

Things changed when the import tax was lifted. Inexpensive clothes came flooding in and the New Zealand clothing companies couldn't compete. Pretty soon they all closed down.

Try this in small groups:

1. Put on the yellow thinking hat and list some good things about the import taxes on clothes from overseas.
2. Put on the black hat and list some bad things about the import taxes. (There must have been some because the big taxes have disappeared.)
3. So what's your feeling or hunch. Put on the red hat and decide whether the import tax should stay away or come back.
4. Share your ideas with other groups in the class.

Rewind answers
1. True. The Mount Cook Motor Company used a large Leyland "Red Lorry" for carrying goods. It was probably the first of the "big rigs" on New Zealand roads.
2. True.
3. False. The arrows had disappeared by then.
4. True. This happened at Mt Ruapehu.
5. True. They were concerned with family and community issues and aimed to promote world peace.

Word watch answers
1b, 2a, 3a, 4b, 5a, 6b, 7b, 8a, 9a, 10b