- 86 - considers the respective assembly operations of B&L Ireland and B&L Hong Kong to constitute the manufacture or production of sun- glasses. In this respect, we find the opinions expressed by petitioners' expert Mr. Nieh to be most instructive. Mr. Nieh was employed by Polaroid in its sunglass business from 1956 through 1988. In addition to his participating in Polaroid's sunglass business, Mr. Nieh participated in, and served as the president of, the SAA and served on committees of ANSI in areas relating to sunglass standards. In his opening report, Mr. Nieh discussed the sunglass in- dustry in general, including the differences between low-end or regular sunglasses and high-end or quality sunglasses. He described the importance of "appearance" and "fit" to the con- sumer of quality sunglasses; that is to say, a consumer will not purchase a pair of quality sunglasses that are priced two-to-ten times higher than regular sunglasses unless they meet his or her standards for appearance and fit. He described the sunglass industry as a "cottage industry" because several levels of manu- facturing, including parts fabrication and final assembly, are necessary to convert raw materials into finished sunglasses. Al- though Mr. Nieh recognized the importance of each level of manu- facturing, he indicated that the sunglass industry considers the assembler, which he referred to as the finished goods manufac- turer, as the most important stage in the manufacture of qualityPage: Previous 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 Next
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