GOODS & SERVICES: New Ideas, may 6, 1957

GOODS & SERVICES

Automatic Teamaking. An automatic teamaking machine has been developed by Food Machinery & Chemical Corp. for the Tea Council of the U.S.A., Inc. and the National Restaurant Association. By infusing fresh tea with 200° F. water, the stainless-steel pushbutton brewer makes 500 cups of hot tea or 400 glasses of iced tea an hour. Teamen see a potential market for the $850 machine in 241,000 high-volume restaurants, note that tea is one of the most lucrative restaurant items, with iced tea grossing an 85% profit. Using a pilot model, one restaurant boosted hot tea sales 125%, iced tea 34%.

Candy Butcher. Replacing old-style coach-car candy butchers, the Pennsylvania Railroad Co. is equipping New York-Washington passenger trains with stainless-steel-and-plastic vending wagons designed by the Coca-Cola Co. Manned by attendants trained to tinkle a polite bell instead of loudly hawking their wares, the carts have insulated containers for hot coffee, cold milk, fruit juice, soft drinks, also carry sandwiches, fruit, pastry, doughnuts, cakes, candy.

Light-Powered Clock. At the annual Swiss Industries Fair in Basel, Patek Philippe & Co. showed off a light-powered clock run by a photoelectric cell that needs to be exposed only four hours daily to any electric source or the sun to be recharged. The clock can store up enough light energy to last a year. Cost: about $500. G. Leon Breitling displayed a new engineer's stop watch with a movable slide rule around its rim, plus five hands and three data dials for calculations of speed and distance. Cost: $100.