Not responsive to the OP, but since the time frame is right:
I recently rediscovered an old investment folder in my files. It contains correspondence regarding my very first investment. At Christmas 1981 I was 16 years old and my father gifted me 5 shares of SJP (St Joseph Light & Power Company, a small utility in Missouri). The company itself eventually succumbed to the utility merger-mania of the 1990s-2000s, and I eventually sold all the stock in the fifth or sixth merger partner as I started converting to a Bogleheads philosophy.
What is most remarkable is that as a new stockholder with only 5 shares, the Treasurer of the company sent - along with the stock certificate - a hand-typed and signed letter on company letterhead welcoming me as a new shareholder, and explaining how their dividend reinvestment program worked if I cared to enroll (I did).
Such a personal touch. Can you imagine a corporate officer doing such a thing these days? He probably had a stack of such investor relations niceties to work through each week. We have really lost some things along the way. Or was this simply an unnecessary inefficiency that was correctly eliminated by the market over time?
I recently rediscovered an old investment folder in my files. It contains correspondence regarding my very first investment. At Christmas 1981 I was 16 years old and my father gifted me 5 shares of SJP (St Joseph Light & Power Company, a small utility in Missouri). The company itself eventually succumbed to the utility merger-mania of the 1990s-2000s, and I eventually sold all the stock in the fifth or sixth merger partner as I started converting to a Bogleheads philosophy.
What is most remarkable is that as a new stockholder with only 5 shares, the Treasurer of the company sent - along with the stock certificate - a hand-typed and signed letter on company letterhead welcoming me as a new shareholder, and explaining how their dividend reinvestment program worked if I cared to enroll (I did).
Such a personal touch. Can you imagine a corporate officer doing such a thing these days? He probably had a stack of such investor relations niceties to work through each week. We have really lost some things along the way. Or was this simply an unnecessary inefficiency that was correctly eliminated by the market over time?
Statistics: Posted by tooluser — Tue Mar 12, 2024 6:40 pm — Replies 24 — Views 2517