Business History · Source Card
A viral Short retells one of the great industrial-arbitrage stories. The core is real; the lesson needs careful wording.
The Short says a German chemical cartel fixed bromine at 49 cents per pound, told Herbert Dow of Midland, Michigan to stop selling abroad, then flooded America with 15-cent bromine to bankrupt him. Dow allegedly bought the cartel’s own cheap product in New York, shipped it back across the Atlantic, sold it in Europe at a profit, and forced the cartel to give up.
The American Chemical Society identifies Dow’s January 4, 1891 electrolytic bromine production from central Michigan brine as a National Historic Chemical Landmark, and says Dow’s processes helped create a stream of chemicals from brines and promoted the growth of the American chemical industry. Dow’s own history pages preserve the founder/bromine-breakthrough context.
Secondary historical accounts from Mackinac, FEE, ICIS and Wikipedia converge on the cartel story: the Bromkonvention’s 49-cent world price, Dow’s 36-cent U.S. price, the German 15-cent dumping move, and Dow’s arbitrage response of buying the dumped bromine and reselling it in Europe.
| Claim | Evidence label |
|---|---|
| In 1904 a German bromine cartel pressured Herbert Dow to stop exporting bromine. | Supported by multiple historical accounts; Mackinac/FEE name Bromkonvention and Hermann Jacobsohn as the envoy. |
| The cartel fixed world bromine prices around 49 cents/lb while Dow sold in the U.S. for 36 cents/lb. | Supported in secondary historical accounts; Dow corporate/ACS confirm Dow’s bromine process and European chemical cartel context. |
| The cartel dumped bromine in the U.S. at 15 cents/lb to bankrupt Dow. | Supported by Mackinac/FEE/Wikipedia/ICIS source trail. |
| Dow responded by buying the cartel’s cheap bromine in America and reselling it in Europe/Germany. | Supported by Mackinac/FEE/Wikipedia/ICIS source trail; a classic arbitrage response to predatory pricing. |
| The cartel later cut U.S. prices to 12 cents and 10.5 cents/lb. | Supported in ICIS/search trail; useful detail but treated as secondary-source specificity. |
| This episode is “the reason Dow Chemical exists.” | Partly rhetorical. Dow Chemical was founded earlier, in 1897, but the episode helped strengthen the company and its competitive legend. |
This is a useful story because it shows how a monopoly attack can create an unexpected counter-trade. It also shows why viral business history needs one extra step: the headline may be true enough to teach a lesson while still compressing chronology, sources and incentives.
