Get-Togethers

Atop a wave of postwar business mergers, two whitecaps stood out last week: J. P. Stevens & Co., Inc., one of the oldest names in the U.S. textile industry, wove a new pattern with nine fabric manufacturers.* The proposed combine would put 28 mills under one management, give the company the industry's biggest capitalization: $75 million. The fabric would be loosely woven, with each company keeping its present management and operating as a division of Stevens. Biggest advantage: common ownership of mills making rayon, cotton and woolen fabrics, as a hedge against a collapse in the market of any one of the fabrics.

Pittsburgh's top department store, Kaufmann's, and the up & coming May Department Stores Co. teamed up to share the title of biggest U.S. department store chain with Macy's. Last year the May Co. (with stores in St. Louis, Cleveland, Akron, Baltimore, Denver and Los Angeles) had net sales of $202,449,639. Kaufmann's hit $43,904,188. Kaufmann's Edgar J. Kaufmann will be a vice president of the new firm; May's Morton May is expected to be top man. Together, they hope to push sales up to $300 million this year, a figure Macy's hopes to meet.

*Aragon-Baldwin Mills, Duncan Mills, M. T. Stevens & Sons Co., Slater-Carter-Stevens, Inc., Victor-Monagha'n Co., Watts Mills, Piedmont Manufacturing Co., Republic Cotton Mills, Wallace Manufacturing Co., Inc.

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