History of Hoover
The story begins in 1907. Murray
Spangler, an inventor who worked nights as a janitor, was cleaning rugs in a
Canton, Ohio, department store. But all the dust raised from his broom
aggravated his asthma, and he called upon his inventor's creativity to find a
solution to the problem. Spangler gathered a tin soap box, a fan, a sateen
pillow case and a broom handle, then assembled an odd-looking, cumbersome
contraption that managed to pull the dust away from the air he breathed. He
quickly realized that this "suction sweeper," as he called it, now now as vacuum
cleaner, had enormous sales potential, and he began seeking financial backing.
Spangler's cousin, Susan Hoover,
agreed to try the vacuum in her home. Before long, she was singing its praises
to her husband, W.H. "Boss" Hoover, owner of a leather goods manufacturing shop.
Hoover bought the patent from Spangler in 1908, retained him as a partner, and
soon had six employees assembling six vacuum cleaners a day in a corner of the
leather goods shop.
Hoover placed a small ad in the
Saturday Evening Post offering 10 days' free use of a Hoover suction sweeper to
anyone who wrote and requested it. But instead of sending the cleaner directly
to the potential customer, he chose a reputable store in each city from which
requests arrived and sent the product to that store. He sent a letter requesting
that the store manager deliver the machine and keep the commission from any
resulting sale, then offered the store the opportunity to become a dealer for
the Company. This laid the groundwork for a national dealer network which
continues today as the main channel of distribution for Hoover products.
Meanwhile, engineers were
designing new methods of cleaning carpet and vacuum cleaners in keeping with the
mission of Hoover's engineering and design development program, which had been
established in 1909.
One of their most noteworthy
innovations was the vacuum cleaner beater bar or brushroll, introduced in 1926,
which was the basis for the vacuum's advertising slogan: "It beats as it sweeps
as it cleans." Here's how it works: As a metal bar gently taps the carpet to
loosen deeply embedded dirt, a bristle brush rapidly sweeps the carpet aided by
strong suction.
The beater bar, further refined to
become the Quadraflex agitator for double the brushing action, is utilized in
most Hoover vacuum cleaners today. And countless other "firsts" have been
developed by Hoover engineers over the years to give consumers their most-wanted
convenience features. These include the disposable paper bag, the vacuum cleaner
headlight, the self-propelled feature and the side-mounted attached hose
feature, for which Hoover received a patent in 1936 - long before consumers
showed an interest in it. |
