Lochcarron Sold to Koreans

[James Hood]

This whole global economy thing is still not entirely comfy in this Conservative Luddite mind....

[Morris at Heathfield]

Does anyone know if the Lochcarron discussed above has any connection to the weavers on the shores of Loch Carron (between Lochcarron and North Strome)?

There's a video on the history of Lochcarron here, narrated by Wedge Antilles. The answer is yes. The business got its start in Lochcarron shortly before moving to Selkirk on the Borders.

[BEEDEE]

Let's hope it works out well for all concerned.

Brian

[ScotAtHeart]

Well...that's too bad. I hope it doesn't affect the business too much. I just ordered a kilt from them too....

[Riverkilt]

Say it ain't so!!!!

[triolamj]

Lochcarron under the old management left a bad taste in my mouth. (Refer to my old, old posts about them.) I'm sorry for the people in Selkirk, but the only reason I own a Lochcarron kilt is that I thought I was buying an American-made kilt with Scottish fabric. If the Koreans decide to clear out the marginally selling tartans, I'm sure that mine, Munster Province Irish, will be in the first batch. Hopefully, they'll turn out a quality fabric and a more affordable casual kilt with the correct number of pleats.

[MacMillan of Rathdown]

Doesn't matter. Still not gonna be the same. Ever again.

Same thing was said about the sale of Rolls-Royce to BMW and Bentley to Volkswagen... but, except to those few people who keep track of such things, nobody else noticed (or seemed to care) and their respective products are actually better than the ones that rolled out of the factory pre-takeover.

I suspect it will be much the same with Lochcarron.

[Manitoban Keith]

hopefully the quality remains the same!

it got me thinking to this old video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4h3ewZxrqU4

[RockyR]

We'll have to wait to see how this plays out. I don't think that the quality of cloth will be affected, but I do worry about their range of tartans in the long run. I'll keep my fingers crossed and continue to support them.

[CDNSushi]

Ownership means nothing anymore. Any ol' halfwit can BUY and OWN a company... But managing it and operating it well are a different story. I don't know much about this Korean company, but something tells me that they probably have plans for it that will likely include producing large quantities of specific tartans for the Korean market...

From what I know about Korea (and Koreans), they are NOTHING like the Japanese. The Japanese, outside of certain very specific niches, are absolutely hopeless businesspeople, extremely rigid and set in their ways, and make awful business decisions. They also tend to be complacent, and prefer business to come to THEM rather than going out and getting the customers.

On the other hand, the experience I've had with Koreans, is that they were extremely ambitious, very eager to learn, adapt, and innovate, some almost to a scary, unethical point where the pursuit of their own, personal goals would supersede all else. "Mr. Kim. This man wants a blue kilt! Turn on the blue light, please!"

But I do think that this is very much a "wait and see" scenario as it could easily go in any direction. But I will tell you for a fact that the Koreans didn't invest in Lochcarron to lose money.