O. Mustad & Søn
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| Private | |
| Industry | Fishing tackle |
| Founded | 1832 |
| Headquarters | Gjøvik, Norway |
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Key people
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Hans Holth Mustad, Owner Lars Lemhag, CEO |
| Products |
Fish hooks Fishing lines Terminal tackle Fishing flies |
| Website | www.mustad.no |
O. Mustad & Son A.S. is a Norwegian company that manufactures and sells fishing tackle and accessories since 1877. The Mustad product range includes fish hooks, multifilament and monofilament fishing lines, fishing lures, fishing flies, fly hooks, terminal tackle and fishing clothes. The corporate headquarters are in Gjøvik, Norway.
Mustad can trace its roots back to 1832 in Vardal. Then the farmer Hans Schikkelstad established the factory "Brusveen Spiger- og Staltradfabrikk" for the production of nails, steel wire and various metal products. Later, Skikkelstad's son-in-law Ole Hovelsen Mustad, took over the company with his son Hans and changed its name to "O. Mustad" and later "O. Mustad & Son". The company was headquartered in the small village of Gjøvik (Norway), an area with poor infrastructures where transportation was an obstacle to most type of supplies: this favoured the development of many local businesses fulfilling the local communities' needs of everything from food and clothing to tools, schooling and even health services.
In spite of the negative conditions and the pessimistic visions of the Norwegian Department of Interior ("The difficulty in competing with foreign factories means that industry will never succeed in this country"), by 1860 Ole Mustad led his company to a primary position in the production of small metal products like fencing wire, nails, pins, fish hooks, horseshoe nails, shipbuilding nails, paper clips, thumb tacks and an almost endless series of other metallic wire-based products. By refining and industrializing the manual production of fish hooks in 1877, the company managed to become a global market leader in just a few years. In some parts of the world 'Mustad' is in fact the local word for a fish hook.
The growth and successes of the 1870s were followed by recession, mirroring the overall European crisis. The stagnation of the building activities resulted in a decreasing demand for nails. Hans Mustad, who in the meantime had taken the management over, experienced a very critical time which brought him to the suspension of all payments in 1879. Fear took hold of creditors and employees, as so many other companies had gone bankrupt in the same period, but something extraordinary happened: the workers continued working indefatigably, without payment for 2 years. They received "Mustad banknotes" instead: the notes acted as written acknowledgments from Mustad and were accepted by shops in Gjøvik. The whole debt including interests was paid back by July 1882 and all creditors got their check during a memorable dinner at Hans Mustad's home. Since then, Mustad's entrepreneurial philosophy took the company to assume wide responsibilities over employees and their families: children were provided schools and several recreational and welfare activities were offered. Hans Mustad's social disposition attracted attention of the press that started visiting the factory premises and its schools, band, choir, library and shop.
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Wikipedia