Trust Secures Can Plant
(Original article at California Digital Newspaper Collection, March 15 1902 San Francisco Call.)
Hunt Brothers Dispose of Their Factory to the Combine: Special Concession Is Made To Them by Purchasing Company
Oakland Office San Francisco Call. 1118 Broadway, March 14.
The only opposition of any importance that has developed to the American Can Company, otherwise the "tin can trust," has been absorbed. The factory that was in course of construction in Oakland by Hunt Brothers has been purchased by the American Can Company, and the trust is now in supreme control of the situation as far as tin cans are concerned.
Hunt Brothers, when they started to fight the California Fruit Canners Association, found themselves also fighting the American Can Company, which was in harmony with the Fruit Canners' Association. They also found themselves unable to get cans on as favorable terms as the opposition combination, and they were decidedly handicapped. They then established a small can plant in Oakland and managed to get a little tin and manufacture a few cans for their own use.
The Hunts went into the market this year and managed to purchase a lot of tin. They then began the construction of a large can plant at the foot of Oak street, doubling their capacity and taking a lot of contracts from the canning companies that are not in the combine. The success of the Hunt Brothers in getting their new can plant in working order brought the trust to time, and it has now purchased the factory that menaced them. The sale price is said to be $30,000, with a guarantee upon the part of the trust that the Hunts win be able to purchase cans for five years at a rate of $2 a thousand less than the market price, they agreeing to keep out of the can manufacturing business for. ten years.
What effect this sale will have upon other independent canners who had given Hunt Brothers contracts for cans is not known. Work on the new plant has been stopped and all of the workmen discharged. The Hunts admit the sale of their plant to the trust.