Focus on: A Catalog Startup

By Reported Donna Loyle

Chronology: Blair & Crossing Pointe

1910 John L. Blair, a student at the University of Pennsylvania and a native of Warren, PA, begins selling men’s raincoats for a classmate who inherited a raincoat factory. Blair establishes the New Process Rubber Co. using $500 in borrowed funds to print and mail flyers to 10,000 undertakers, his target demographic for the raincoats. He sells 400 coats, which featured a layer of rubber between two layers of cloth. For many years, Blair runs the business from Philadelphia, while shipping was done across the state in Warren.