The batch we had to remake

In March a batch of forty day satchels went out with straps cut from the belly of the hide, where the leather is looser. Within a month the first came back with a strap two centimetres longer than it left.

We wrote to every one of the forty buyers, remade the straps from the shoulder, and posted them free. Thirty-one people took us up on it. The rest said theirs were fine, and we have asked them to tell us if that changes.

It cost about four thousand dollars and a fortnight of bench time. The cutting sheet now marks the belly in red, and no strap is cut from it.