Oneida Limited

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Oneida Limited is one of the world's largest marketers of stainless steel flatware, and offers a range of tabletop products. Its operations in the United States, Canada, Mexico, the United Kingdom and Australia market stainless, silverplated, and sterling flatware products, china dinnerware, and crystal and glassware items[1]. The company originated in a utopian community, the Oneida Society, established in the mid-nineteenth century, and has had a strong reputation for quality since that time[2].

Incorporated as one of the earliest joint-stock companies in the United States in the late 1880s, Oneida Community started production of silver-plated flatware and hollow-ware in 1899 using the "Community Plate" mark. Oneida Community purchased the Wm Rogers and 1881 Rogers companies in 1929 and started producing a somewhat lower-quality line of products using those company marks. In 1935 Oneida Community changed its name to Oneida Ltd[3].

After successfully adapting to the difficult economic conditions of the two world wars and the depression, and managing a successful transition to the manufacture of stainless steel flatware in 1961 which eventually dwarfed its production of silver-plated flatware[4], the company fell victim to tough economic times in the late 1990s as it tried to hold on to its mantle as the last remaining US-based manufacturer of flatware (knives, forks and spoons). The company shuttered its American factories and became an importer and was taken private in 2006. [5]