Macintosh & Co

Back in the before-times, when e-commerce was still barely a thing, (1997, actually, according to the shipping label) I ordered several yards of fabric to make my own kilt in the Irish National tartan from a kiltmaker in Scotland. Their website at the time acted more-or-less as a catalog, as you couldn't order from it yet, but you could visit the shop in person, or order via phone. Not wanting to deal with the costs of international calling, I emailed the shop what I wanted, arranged to send encrypt my credit card information in a separate email, and the entire transaction was performed via email.

I am not sure why, but this entire thing popped into my head yesterday. I ordered slightly too little fabric back then, but kept the tartan and the paper packaging it was shipped in. I knew exactly where I have it stored, so I went out to grab a picture of the shipping label because I decided to look and see if the company was still around. Unfortunately, Macintosh in Scotland is like Jones or Smith is here, so Macintoch and Company doesn't really help. So I decided to look up the address it shipped from, which apparently houses a sweet shop now.

I am sure the owner would have retired by now. Or grown and changed their name. Or been put out of business by a larger company. Or merged with another company. Or any number of other possible fates. At any rate, if anyone happens to know what happened to Macintosh and Co, which was located at 499 Lawnmarket in Edinburgh back in 1997, please contact me. I would love to know what happened to the owner in the 25+ years since.