World's last typewriter factory shuts shop

Mumbai: Typewriters have long gone out of fashion with the advent of computers but the news that the last typewriter factory left in the world has stopped production has caught everyone's interest.

"There was no media buzz when the company stopped manufacturing typewriters in 2009 since diminishing sales made it unviable for us to go on," Milind Dukle, General Manager, Operations, Godrej and Boyce, told Gulf News. Ever since the news broke out, the company has been receiving calls from people wanting to buy the manual machine, the production of which started in 1955. Sales of office typewriters plummeted to 10,000 in 2008 when it was decided that the manufacture must come to an end.

Not just in India but Godrej is the last factory in the world to stop the production of the heavy office typewriter "though there could be others still producing the light portable ones." Others products — Halda, Remington and Facit — have all shut shop years back, the last being Facit in 2004.

The last typewriter to come out of the factory has been preserved by the company as part of its history whilst the "last batch of around 200 typewriters, a few in English and majority in Arabic, are yet to be sold," said Dukle. Godrej made only office typewriters which in their heydays were also exported abroad, mainly to the Middle East and African countries where the Arabic typewriters were in high demand.