Thread: 1908 Razor Ad

Found this online. A newspaper ad from 1908 Chicago Newspaper. Thought I'd share it. Look at those prices.

That's what I was paying for vintage razors at garage sales in the 70's. I could always find at least one at a sale or auction. Now look at the prices and how hard they are to find.

yea, look at what the average working man's wage was in those days.

My father used to tell stories about 25 cent pitchers of draft beer. You and you buddies could drink all night for ten dollars was what he said. Having seen him and his buddies carry on I doubt they could have gone a whole night for ten bucks though, maybe twenty.

It's all relative, as those prices were probably steep back then. I wish I had them razors though, thanks for posting!

I'm not so sure they were steep even then. Without doing any searching on average wages - or inflation since then - let's say an average razor was $1.50 then and that razor is comparable to say a $150 razor now - that's a 100 fold increase. How do wages compare in the US today? Would I be in the right range that average wages are around $60k to $70k? If so, then dividing by 100 gives an average annual $650 back then - or $13 per week. You tell me whether the average was better or worse than that - my guess is the average man would have earned more than that in 1908.

There's the wages. Average laborer $200-400/yr.

2$ then is equivalent to about 50$ today, so those prices are pretty good. However, as mentioned above the wages were very low at that time.

Sure would be sweet to have one of each.

Well not only were they wages a little different but according to the elders I know, not many people had much for disposable income at the turn of the century. That was not until much later in the century.