© Frank H. Jump
© Frank H. Jump
© Frank H. Jump
© Frank H. Jump
Woods Canada Limited was founded in 1885 and has been a well-known Canadian manufacturer of outdoor clothing and equipment. Woods was most famous for their good quality sleeping bags which they made in Toronto until 2005. According to Prof. W. Tim G. Richardson, a full-time Professor at Seneca College, and concurrently teaching at the University of Toronto, on an academic website discussing the effects of globalization on North American industries, Richardson speaks about how Canadian Tire’s overseas sourcing led to a Canadian icon losing business Ricardson states:
As explained by the president of Woods, David G. Earthy, a significant part of Woods business was supplying Canadian Tire – in fact the two companies had a supplier – retailer relationship more than 80 years. Earthy explained Woods had to shut down operations following “…a decision by the Company’s largest customer, Canadian Tire, to discontinue purchasing domestically manufactured sleeping bags.” It has been suggested by others in the industry that Canadian Tire (facing competition from Wal-mart and other big vendors of camping equipment) had to further cut costs and was simply geting cheaper sleeping bags from suppliers in China. – Witiger dot com
