著者

脇村 春夫

出版者

経営史学会

雑誌

経営史学 (ISSN:03869113)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.38, no.4, pp.1-29, 2004-03-25 (Released:2010-11-18)

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Large independent cotton textile weavers used to be located in the cotton weaving textile industrial areas in the western part of Japan. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the various factors contributing to the successes or failures of large cotton weavers; while some large cotton weavers succeeded and survive to this day, many more were forced to discontinue their business activities. The methods of analysis are based on case studies of each company through interviews, or oral history. The definition of “large” cotton weaver in this paper is 1) ownership of 1, 000 rooms, either before or after the Second World War or 2) a turnover that had once exceeded 8 billion yen. Out of 23 cotton weavers that fall under these conditions, 7 companies still survive, while 16 have disbanded. Concerning the origins of various cotton weaving industrial areas located in Sennan, Senboku, Chita, Banshu, Enshu, Chugoku, etc., 15 companies out of 23 were situated in Sennan, Senboku, and Chita. Most of the large weavers were originally form these three areas because of contracts from large textile mills and trading firms for mass production of grey fabrics for export. From the middle-1980s, however, export of such mass production fabrics as poplin, broad and lawn for started to wane because of yen appreciation production of these fabrics consequently lost in the competition for exports, and a big increase in imported fabrics and apparels followed. Those large weavers who succeeded in converting to either heavy gauge fabrics, like twill or denim, or high value-added thin gauge fabrics for domestic usage, which China could not produce, were able to survive. Those who relied on large textile mills for mass production products for export failed to survive. Finally, this paper concludes that the main factor determining the ability or failure to survive, was the speed at which company management was capable of switching its products from the exports to domestic market.