Ben Cooper (Company)

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Ben Cooper

logo
legal form Incorporation , holding company
founding 1937
resolution 1992
Reason for dissolution insolvency
Seat Brooklyn , New York City (1937–1991)
Greensboro , North Carolina (1991–1992)
management Ben Cooper Sr.
Branch Halloween costumes , masks

Ben Cooper, Inc. was an American company that mainly produced Halloween costumes from 1930 to early 1990 . Between 1950 and 1980 it was one of the three largest companies in this market segment. The plastic masks and vinyl capes , which are quite inexpensive in terms of price, were an American symbol of Halloween, especially from the 1950s to the 1970s. The company was therefore also referred to as " Halston " of Halloween or the "High Priest" of Halloween.

Company history

Luminous mummy mask from the 1960s

Company founder and namesake Ben Cooper was born in 1906 on the Lower East Side of New York City . Although his father was a simple innkeeper, Cooper was able to study accounting and initially earned his living as a songwriter . In 1927 he finally founded a theater costume company . He created his most famous works from this period for the legendary Cotton Club in Harlem and for Ziegfeld Follies on Broadway .

After the theater lost its traction during the Great Depression , but Halloween became more and more popular as a holiday, Cooper changed saddles and finally founded Ben Cooper Inc. in Brooklyn in 1937 . The company took over AS Fishbach, Inc., which at the time had licenses to Walt Disney characters such as Donald Duck and Snow White and was able to sell these characters' costumes. The two companies formally merged on December 8, 1942 under the name Ben Cooper, Inc.

By the late 1940s, Ben Cooper had become the largest and most popular Halloween costume maker in the United States. The costumes were made inexpensively and were mostly made of thin fabric with a screen print on the front. They cost about three dollars (around 30 euros today). The company began serving large retail chains such as JC Penney , Woolworth , Sears and various specialty stores , where the price was cut by a third. The most popular at that time were devil, ghost, skeleton and witch costumes. In the 1950s it was mostly comic and television characters like Davy Crockett , Superman and Zorro who led the market. When the security efforts became more important among the population, Ben Cooper developed so-called “Glitter Glo costumes”, which reflected the headlights of the cars through blue glitter and thus made the children more recognizable for drivers. The company also earned on the popularity of John F. Kennedy and his wife, Jacqueline Kennedy . However, after the assassination attempt on John F. Kennedy , they had to destroy thousands of masks.

C-3PO costume from 1977

In the 1960s and 1970s, Ben Cooper was one of the three largest Halloween costume manufacturers, along with Collegeville and the H. Halpern Company (Halco). In these years, too, the company relied on figures that were just coming into fashion and tried to market them as quickly as possible. So Spider-Man licensed it before the series became popular after 1963, and Batman a year later.

The market hit was a mask by US President Richard Nixon , which sold as well as the famous Ronald Reagan mask in the 1980s. George HW Bush was given a mask back in 1987, as the company assumed he would win the election. In 1979 the company produced a costume for an R-rated film for the first time (under 17 years of age only when accompanied by an adult): a costume for the alien from Alien - The uncanny creature from an alien world .

While the company was still the market leader in 1979, it began to make losses in the 1980s. The reasons were that in 1982 seven people died in Chicago from taking the pain reliever paracetamol . Investigators found that someone had intentionally added potassium cyanide to the drug . Frightened parents therefore forbade their children to play "Trick or Treat" on Halloween for fear of further or similar murders. As a result, sales of Halloween costumes collapsed suddenly and only slowly recovered in the following years. In response, Ben Cooper founded the Halloween Celebration Committee with eight other costume makers, which brought out a brochure entitled 13 Great Ways to Celebrate Halloween , which was supposed to reassure parents and thus boost sales again. Still the market leader, the company managed to recover in 1987 and increase sales by 20%.

insolvency

However, the increase in sales was not sufficient to prevent bankruptcy . Many customers went to Collegeville's largest competitor. On March 13, 1988, the company filed for bankruptcy. As an investment company, the actual numbers were kept secret, but there were reports that profits had fallen below 10%. When one of the company's buildings in Georgia burned down on January 6, 1989 , the company claims it lost between $ 2 million and $ 3 million in goods. Both insurance companies refused to pay. The claims were also not considered in the insolvency proceedings. However, Ben Cooper managed to prevent bankruptcy (for the time being).

In 1990 and 1991, Cooper litigated the two insurance companies. The matter even went to the Supreme Court . After a lengthy trial, Cooper won.

With the money from the insurance companies and the income from the previous year, they had big plans. In 1991 the company moved to Greensboro , North Carolina. At the time, the company had 35 permanent employees and produced four million costumes. It controlled 70 to 80 percent of the licensed character costume market and had contracts with Children's Television Workshop (producers of Sesame Street ), DC Comics , Mattel, and Walt Disney. The aim of the move was to be closer to the textile processing companies in the southern United States in order to be able to produce in a more environmentally friendly manner.

Rubie's Costume Co

On October 30, 1991, the company had to file for bankruptcy again. The change of location had made a miscalculation. The 1990 recession and default interest on bank bonds also hit the company. It did not recover this time and was bought by Rubie's Costume Co. in 1992.

Collector's value

Products from Ben Cooper are coveted collector's items today. In particular, original costumes with masks that are still wrapped up achieve top prices at auctions. Photographer Phyllis Galembo published a book in 2002 called Dressed for Thrills: 100 Years of Halloween Costumes & Masquerade , which features many of Ben Cooper's costumes.

literature

  • Galembo, Phyllis: Dressed for Thrills: 100 Years of Halloween Costumes and Masquerade. New York: Harry N. Abrams, 2002.
  • Halloween Costume In: Encyclopedia of Clothing and Fashion. Valerie Steele, ed. New York: Charles Scribners & Sons, 2004.

Web links

Commons : Ben Cooper  - Collection of Images, Videos and Audio Files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Rinker, "Halloween Costumes Worth Scaring Up By Collectors," The Morning Call, November 10, 1996.
  2. ↑ Sandstrom, "Frightfully Collectible," The Plain Dealer, October 28., 1994
  3. ↑ a b c d e f g Shapiro, “Trick and Treat! Ben Cooper Bags Millions as the Halston of Halloween, “ People, October 29, 1979.
  4. ^ "Ghoul Gear," The Village Voice, October 25-31, 1973.
  5. ^ A b c d "Halloween Costume," in Encyclopedia of Clothing and Fashion, 2004, p. 167.
  6. ↑ "Snow White Costumes By Fishbach," Playthings, June 1938, p. 47. (PDF; 6.6 MB)
  7. ^ "Ben Cooper, Inc." Entity Information. Division of Corporations. New York State Department of State. June 25, 2003  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Retrieved September 20, 2010, 2010@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / appext9.dos.state.ny.us  
  8. ↑ a b Fendelman, "Vintage Halloween Costumes," Country Living, October 1, 2007.
  9. ^ Rosenkrantz, "Chills and Thrills Have Long History," San Diego Union-Tribune, Oct. 20, 2002.
  10. ^ Moody, "Television Land Outside Your Door," The Hartford Courant, Oct. 30, 1960.
  11. ↑ a b Rinker, "Unmasking the Value of Old Halloween Costumes," The Morning Call, October 23, 2007.
  12. ↑ McLaughlin, “Costumes' Popularity Is Absolutely Batty,” St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Oct. 26, 1989.
  13. ^ A b Szadkowski, "New Superheroes Suit Up With Halloween Standards," The Washington Times, October 11, 2003; Everhart, "Halloween: A Family Business," Selling Halloween, February 2007. ( Memento of the original dated August 7, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.sellinghalloween.com
  14. ↑ Petty, p. 737.
  15. ↑ a b c d Kleinfeld, "The Weird, the Bad and the Scary," New York Times, October 15, 1989
  16. ^ Lesem, "Booklet Aims to Make '83 Halloween Trick-or-Treat Both Scary and Safe," United Press International, October 4, 1983.
  17. ^ Kita, "Just Needle and Thread Create Stuff of Dreams - and Nightmares," The Morning Call, October 25, 1984.
  18. ↑ DeCaro, "Grown-Up Goblins: Halloween Fantasies Let the Ghoul Times Roll for Stressed Out Baby Boomers," Chicago Tribune, October 25, 1987.
  19. ^ Fricker, "Raisins Are Sweet for Costume Maker," The Morning Call, October 26, 1988.
  20. ^ "Ben Cooper Files to Reorganize in Chapter 11," Daily News Record, March 14, 1988; "Cooper Agrees to Pay Unsecured Creditors 100%," Daily News Record, October 26, 1988.
  21. ^ In re Ben Cooper, Inc. , 896 F.2d 1394, 1396 (2d Cir. 1990).
  22. ↑ a b c Scism, "Court Lets Costume Firm Seek Jury Trial On slogan," Greensboro News-Record, May 16, 1991.
  23. ^ A b c "Major Bankruptcy Ruling Stands," Business Insurance, June 3, 1991.
  24. ↑ a b In re Ben Cooper, Inc. , 896 F.2d 1394, 1396-1397.
  25. ^ In re Ben Cooper, Inc. , 896 F.2d 1394, 1404.
  26. ^ Insurance Company of the State of Pennsylvania v. Ben Cooper, Inc. , 498 US 964 (1990).
  27. ^ In re Ben Cooper, Inc. , 924 F.2d 36 (2d Cir. 1991).
  28. ↑ a b c d Scism, "Greensboro Gains New Jobs As Costume Maker Relocates," Greensboro News-Record, January 8. 1991
  29. ↑ a b c Scism, "Bankruptcy Repeat No Treat for Costume Manufacturer," Greensboro News-Record, October 31., 1991
  30. ↑ Yvaska, "Spirited Noise Makers," San Jose Mercury News, Oct. 29, 2005.
  31. ^ Miller, "Mask Oriented," Salon.com, Oct. 30, 2002 ; Galembo, Dressed for Thrills: 100 Years of Halloween Costumes and Masquerade, 2002.