Some Things Survive
T.
T.
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Low-tech survivor
A holdover from the typewriter age - correction fluid, or white-out -
is still going strong in spite of the computer's backspace key.
By ROBERT JOHNSON
© St. Petersburg Times
published August 11, 2003
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[Times photo illustration: Sherman Zent]
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Typing XX has becoame XXXX much easier in thee past 20 yearrs.
In the days of typewriters, you would have slathered correction fluid
on a typo-ridden sentence like the one above, blown on the page to dry
it, then pecked out a corrected version.
Today, the typewriter has been all but replaced by the personal
computer, with a backspace key that can obliterate errors in an
instant. Yet somehow white-out survives and prospers. The correction
fluid industry is a $120-million business. Roughly 16.3-million
gallons is sold a year, enough to paint the exteriors of 273,000
typical houses.
And this godsend for goof-ups has a projected sales growth rate of 2
percent through 2004, according to Barry Calpino, a vice president of
Newell Rubbermaid Inc. It owns the ubiquitous Liquid Paper brand, the
original white-out product.
That's not a rate likely to set off fireworks on Wall Street, but
compare it to the stagnant sales of typewriters.
"We went to computers years ago, but I still use white-out," says Bill
Daniel, manager of the St. Petersburg Police Department's community
awareness division. For example, there are those last-minute
alterations to handwritten payroll sheets. "If the payroll is done and
then there's an after-hours SWAT call-up, you need to make changes in
a hurry."
Righting honest mistakes isn't the only purpose for which correction
fluid is used. In June, after an investigation, the Canadian
Parliament censured one of its officers for the first time in history.
His alleged offense: using white-out to conceal an incomplete tally of
expense reports.
Forgers have long kept white-out in their tool kits, says Stan
Pruszynski, a New York criminal defense lawyer. To avoid becoming a
victim, he says, "I tell all my clients, if you see something on a
document that has been changed with correction fluid, find out what
was covered up."
But a few bad alterers shouldn't be allowed to smear the goodwill that
white-out has earned with a blooper-plagued public, proponents say.
"The one thing that endures is life's pressures," says Calpino, a man
who's quick to forgive routine errors (at least by those who buy from
his product line).
The typo, or typographical error, is still very much with us,
including those that go on far beyond one fat-fingered letter or
number to ramble for several spaces or entire lines.
Victoria Dunn, a clinical psychologist in St. Petersburg, says those
who cling to correction fluid may do so "because it's a symbol of
security for them. If white-out once relieved a stressful situation,
they may always want to have a bottle around, even if they don't use
it that much."
At BIC USA in Milford, Conn., whose Wite-Out brand is Liquid Paper's
top competitor in a tight battle for supremacy, Tim Koletsos, national
customer development manager for stationery, lists categories of
corrections:
"Covering mistakes on envelopes and greeting cards, covering mistakes
on checkbooks, tax forms, covering old addresses in an address book to
insert the contact's correct information . . ."
Sales really heat up in August when students prepare for a new school
year. "Homework, term papers, posters are all work that may need
correcting," Liquid Paper's Calpino says. "The posters are important
because the amount needed there usually isn't just a little dab."
The industry began life in the 1950s with just a dab here and there.
The inventor was a Dallas secretary named Bette Nesmith Graham, who by
her own admission had terrible typing skills.
Graham took a second job painting the windows of a local bank, where
she noticed that experienced lettering artists simply painted over
their errors. It was her "Eureka!" moment. Experimenting at home, she
bottled some tempera-based paint, took it to work and began correcting
her typing mistakes.
When secretarial colleagues urged her to supply them, she made a few
improvements with the help of her son's chemistry teacher, study at
the library and experiments in her garage. By 1956, Graham had a small
business selling what she called Mistake Out. She changed the name to
Liquid Paper in the 1960s, and annual sales hit $1-million in 1968.
Graham, who died in 1980, left a reported fortune of $450-million -
half of it to charities and the rest to her son, Michael Nesmith of
rock 'n roll fame as a member of the Monkees.
"The Monkees are still around and so are correction fluids," Calpino
says.
The fix-it fluid comes in more varieties than ever.
BIC Wite-Out comes in seven colors. Bottled white-out still accounts
for more than half the industry's sales, despite the development of
markers and press-on tape that doesn't need dry time.
Now there's a bottle with a broad foam brush to correct larger
mistakes. There's a "no-lump" version, an "extra coverage" type to
hide red ink and a water-based product for users concerned about the
hard stuff's solvent vapors. Another is nonflammable, although it
won't protect the paper underneath from going up in smoke.
Yet none of these creations can hide what may be the most enduring
problem posed by correction fluids: They're a mess when you spill
them. BIC addresses questions about clean up with a Wite-Out "Removal
Tips" page on its Web site (www.witeout.com)
"Scratch most of the spill off with your fingernail or the edge of a
coin," is one idea. Nail polish remover may be used on your hands with
"appropriate caution" is another tidbit. But for some garments,
dry-cleaning may be the only hope.
Or you can always try covering up the offending white-out with swipe
of correction fluid in the color of your garment. The blue, green and
red do an excellent job of concealment.
Sally Carpenter
"> "The Monkees are still around and so are correction fluids," Calpino
> says.
Which one will be more in demand 50 years from now?
>
> Yet none of these creations can hide what may be the most enduring
> problem posed by correction fluids: They're a mess when you spill
> them. BIC addresses questions about clean up with a Wite-Out "Removal
> Tips" page on its Web site (www.witeout.com)
One day I called up the corporate offices and complained that my
fluid always splattered out of the bottle. The office sent me one of their
"pens." Looks like a pen but filled with correction fluid. When you
squeeze the pen, a tiny trickle of fluid comes out, just enough to cover a
letter. I use the pens all the time now. Not at all messy, plus the fluid
doesn't dry out after using only half the bottle.
>