Victorian Bournemouth (244) has suggested how Bournemouth Steam Laundry’s financial prudence, effective marketing, and worker safety contributed to a robust business model that could withstand the pressures of competition and economic fluctuations. Furthermore, the long-term management style of Robert and Catherine Catt made the company a showcase for how employee satisfaction and commercial profit could co-exist. As a proactive manager, Robert Catt combined attention to detail, commitment to safety, regular innovation, and positive media relations. The Catt family connected their family, friends, and employees into a unified network. This perhaps created a supportive and harmonious work-place environment, benefiting all network members, whatever their social position. The success of this approach perhaps appears in the family’s management of the firm extending over at least two generations and several decades.
Tag: kinship networks
Victorian Bournemouth (181): workhouse pictures
Victorian Bournemouth (181) finds compassion on occasion softening the dark prejudice with which Guardians managed the local workhouse.
Victorian Bournemouth (179): ‘martyr royalty’
Victorian Bournemouth (179) analyses the kinship and social profiles of Tolpuddle natives recorded as Springbourne residents during 1881.
Victorian Bournemouth (178): early Moordown (2)
Victorian Bournemouth (178) resumes exploring the early years whereby an area of heath underwent rapid urban development to become Moordown.
Victorian Bournemouth (171): single mothers (2)
Victorian Bournemouth (171) follows the curious story of a single mother and her daughter through official sources.
Victorian Bournemouth (170): single mothers (1)
Victorian Bournemouth (170) explores the subject of illegitimacy as it occurred within the resort and its suburbs.
Victorian Bournemouth (146): British Indians (4)
Multi-multi-families Introduction Victorian Bournemouth (146) finds public and private links interconnecting the British Indians who settled in the resort during the period 1871-1881. Genealogical analysis provides insights into the social history of Indian natives born to families who had originated in Britain. By the time they arrived in Bournemouth, in some cases, several generations of […]
Victorian Bournemouth (139): Springbourne (3)
Victorian Bournemouth (139) explores further aspects of the community inhabiting Springbourne, the Bournemouth suburb housing many working people.
Victorian Bournemouth (134): the missing £5 note (2)
Victorian Bournemouth (134) concludes an analysis of how a housemaid brought a case of criminal libel against her employer and social superior.
Victorian Bournemouth (133): the missing £5 note (1)
Downstairs v Upstairs Introduction Victorian Bournemouth (133) examines events concerning a parlourmaid who sued her former employer for libel in 1872. The case has a tangential association with Bournemouth, but it highlights how the law could on occasion balance the relationship between affluent and working people. In this case, Lydia Crouchman, a parlourmaid, sued her […]