EICO's history seen through its old catalogs

Vintage Asylum

Classic gear from yesteryear; vintage audio standing the test of time.

Stimulated by an EICO eGroup member's collection of an old EICO 1960 catalog, I just counted the EICO catalogs I have collected so far and got a bit feeling about EICO.
I have 1959, the earliest, 1982, the latest EICO catalogs, and most
of the years in between. I just uploaded a few pictures of the EICO
catalogs to the EICO eGroup for members' amusement.
Some observations to share with inmates here.
1959 - has one full page devoted for reports and tests conducted by
laboratories and audio critics, symbolizing the rise of EICO in the
audio manufacturing industry. Notably the HF-81 as shown has a '6-
option' function selector already. (The '3-option' verion of HF-81
could be very rare indeed!)
1960 to 1963 - covers printed in golden colour. The 'HF' series
monoblocs, stereo power amps, integrated mono amps, AM and FM
tuners, etc. seemed to be the king BUT in the 1960 release only.
The HF series was gradually replaced by the 'Stereo' (ST) series,
e.g. ST-40, ST-70, ST-97, and ST-84 preamp, an evidence of the
monaural era replaced by stereo era - the period making the end fo
the golden history of of EICO's tube audio manufacturing?
1964 to 1965 - printed in white glossy paper. The 'Classic Series'
was the main items being promoted. But more and more solid state
EICO amps and receiver/speaker combos were on the show, a period of
transition and seeking new goals?
1966 to 1968 - printed on lesser quality paper, covers in blue ink,
signifying the downturn of the EICO history? "Cortina" solid state
amps and receivers were the main products, besides various test
equipments. Stereo 40 and 70 integrated amps were still found in the
catalogs but seemingly all were unsold stocks! This signified a
period of downsizing at the failure of launching new goals?
1969 to 1970 - Main products were test equipments and educational
kits. "Cortina" amps/receivers were mentioned but not
predominantly. It seemed EICO was not very successful in launching
solid state "Cortina".
1972 to 1973 - The catalogs contained mainly test equipments,
oscilliscopes and educational kits! "Cortina" amps and receiver
were covered but only in 2 of the 32 pages in 1973. Clearing of
the "Cortina" remaining stocks?
1974 - As shown by the mailing label on the catalog, it seems only
one catalog was used for serveral years up to 1977!
1978 - This catalog was printed in 1977, obviously in late 1977 for
the 1978's use; nothing was related tubes!
1982 - The very last catalog I got. It was printed on coarse
newspaper paper. On front cover there were multitesters and
multimeters - the only popular products of EICO it seems, before
EICO went into dormancy.
On the back cover of the 1982 EICO Catalog, it was said:
"Over 36 years of leadership - For over 36 years, EICO has been
designing and manufacturing electronic products. It is now the
world's largest producer of electronic kits and factory-wired
equipment marketed exclusively through dealers and distributors
throughout the world... - Laboratory Precision at Lowest Cost Since
1945."
In a rapidly declining electronic kits market, nobody including EICO
could thrive in the long run. So, despite EICO remained
the "largest producer", it still could not prosper itself.
It is a bit philsophical to say: EICO won the world but lost in
itself.. How sad!
Inmates interested in EICO tube gears are most welcome to join the EICO eGroup.

Richard CWY - moderator of the EICO eGroup in Yahoo!

EICO Tube Amps Fans Club (Open in New Window)

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Topic - EICO's history seen through its old catalogs - Richard CWY 19:41:50 10/14/03 (3)

One more time....ISO TO-330 - Sector-7G 15:41:54 10/15/03 (0)

Re: EICO's history seen through its old catalogs - spkrman57 05:54:31 10/15/03 (1)

Re: EICO's history seen through its old catalogs - Brian Levy 15:51:09 10/15/03 (0)

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