Handcuff prices

For the holidays, I was given a letter from the Peerless Handcuff Co. quoting their prices (jobber prices, dealer prices, quantity discounts) to some company in Philadelphia. The special thing about the letter is that it's dated on my birthday, back in 1947.

Anyway, in late 1947, the end user price for a set of Peerless handcuffs was $15.05 (f.o.b. Springfield, Mass.). I thought that was rather quaint, until I plugged the numbers into an inflation calculator and discovered that in the year 2005, that is the equivalent of $142.44 in today's (US) dollars.

BFW, that is only 1/2 the cost of a pair of Colt handcuffs on eBay today!!! LOL!

Cheers, Mike

For the holidays, I was given a letter from the Peerless Handcuff Co. quoting their prices (jobber prices, dealer prices, quantity discounts) to some company in Philadelphia. The special thing about the letter is that it's dated on my birthday, back in 1947.

Anyway, in late 1947, the end user price for a set of Peerless handcuffs was $15.05 (f.o.b. Springfield, Mass.). I thought that was rather quaint, until I plugged the numbers into an inflation calculator and discovered that in the year 2005, that is the equivalent of $142.44 in today's (US) dollars.

The following price sheets are from the <A HREF=http://www.handcuffs.org/tower/index.html target=_blank> Tower</A> page on this site: For comparison, a pair of Bean Cobb handcuffs was selling for $6 (circa 1904).

Jason

For the holidays, I was given a letter from the Peerless Handcuff Co. quoting their prices (jobber prices, dealer prices, quantity discounts) to some company in Philadelphia. The special thing about the letter is that it's dated on my birthday, back in 1947.

Anyway, in late 1947, the end user price for a set of Peerless handcuffs was $15.05 (f.o.b. Springfield, Mass.). I thought that was rather quaint, until I plugged the numbers into an inflation calculator and discovered that in the year 2005, that is the equivalent of $142.44 in today's (US) dollars.

I'd been looking around for some of these old catalogs. $1.00 in 1904 is today worth $20.52. I'll let you do the math.

What strikes me as unusual is that in comparison to times past, today you can purchase new, "state-of-the-art" handcuffs for less than half of what such things cost in the past.

For the holidays, I was given a letter from the Peerless Handcuff Co. quoting their prices (jobber prices, dealer prices, quantity discounts) to some company in Philadelphia. The special thing about the letter is that it's dated on my birthday, back in 1947.

Anyway, in late 1947, the end user price for a set of Peerless handcuffs was $15.05 (f.o.b. Springfield, Mass.). I thought that was rather quaint, until I plugged the numbers into an inflation calculator and discovered that in the year 2005, that is the equivalent of $142.44 in today's (US) dollars.

The trend has certainly been a boon to us collectors. I wonder what the cost benefit of switching to protruding rivets was, though I don’t believe that to be the prime factor.

I recall how a friend who was an auxiliary policeman had paid close to $35 (plus tax) for Smith & Wesson model 90 handcuffs, way back in 1977. Considering that $1 in 1977 is equivalent to $3.24 today, these premium brand cuffs were indeed pricey. By the early 80’s, the very same police uniform shop was selling these cuffs for about $27. By then, another retailer had encroached to within a few miles, so I guess that also forced them to cut their profit margin somewhat. When the new models arrived, they were selling the 104 for $55 (plus tax), so I couldn’t resist when I found them on sale through an e-retailer for $30 with no tax if you didn’t live in their state. Of late, I’ve noticed that E-Bay has been swamped with sellers of model 100s that often go for unheard of low prices.

Jason