And now the question is ... who (by age, education, class, geography, political party, etc.) pays attention to which units in such an ad?
Wish we had the data. -- Ezra ----- Original Message ----- From: "Martin Vlietstra" <vliets...@btinternet.com> To: "U.S. Metric Association" <usma@colostate.edu> Sent: Thursday, July 15, 2010 1:44:04 PM Subject: [USMA:48249] Re: Question about US carpet sales. I had house plans drawn up this week of my late mother’s house as part of putting it on the market (she passed away three months ago). A typical description was: BEDROOM 13’5 x 1-‘ 4.1m x 3.1m The total floor area was given in both square metres and square feet. From: owner-u...@colostate.edu [mailto:owner-u...@colostate.edu] On Behalf Of Stephen Davis Sent: 15 July 2010 15:56 To: U.S. Metric Association Subject: [USMA:48246] Re: Question about US carpet sales. Carpet lengths in square metres but many room sizes in square feet? Well, yes Ezra...... welcome to a country that is mostly metric but, due to political pressure (mostly from the right) we won't finish the job. You know the story, motorways measured in kilometres but signposts in miles; wine and spirits in metric measures but draught beer sold in pints. Incidentally, I am not 100 per cent certain on this, but a lot of residential room sizes over here actually ARE in square metres I believe. As tradesmen use metric rules to measure the floorspace for a carpet anyhow, its not really a problem that residential room sizes are in square feet. ----- Original Message ----- From: ezra.steinb...@comcast.net To: U.S. Metric Association Sent: Wednesday, July 14, 2010 10:50 PM Subject: [USMA:48240] Re: Question about US carpet sales. So, how does the UK practice of selling carpeting by the square meter square (if you'll pardon the pardon) with advertising residential room sizes in square yards? (or is it feet)? Don't consumers have to convert the square yards to square meters if they want to completely carpet a particular room (or set of rooms)? That seems rather awkward. And, yes, carpet is both advertised and sold exclusively using Imperial units (square foot, actually) here in the USA. Just as all real estate is described and leased or sold using those same units. Dark Ages over here still, I'm afraid ... -- Ezra ----- Original Message ----- From: "Stephen Davis" <stevo.da...@btinternet.com> To: "U.S. Metric Association" <usma@colostate.edu> Sent: Wednesday, July 14, 2010 11:23:24 AM Subject: [USMA:48238] Question about US carpet sales. Are carpet lengths in the US sold by the sq yard? Of course, gasoline sales are still in gallons over there. If carpet sales are indeed still in sq yards in the US, (I suspect they are) it may well be worth the US government trying to metricate these two things, that is, sq metres for carpet sales and litres for gasoline sales, because, if the UK is any sort of measure, these two things may well be politically acceptable. Why? Well, UK traders accepted these changes virtually overnight because, to be quite frank, they could make more money out of them. Carpet stores and warehouses in the UK could legitimately charge more because a sq metre was more than a sq yard. In the case of gas sales (pr petrol) a litre was obviously far less than a gallon, allowing gas stations to exploit initial customer confusion and get away with charging more than what a litre was actually worth.. No,,,,it certainly isn't the most moral way of introducing more metrication, but it sure worked over here and may well work over there too. It's sometimes amazing how the lure of more bucks can change attitudes. :-)
