Heine Fendelman of Scarsdale, New York sent this item along from Kovels

Kovels Komments [April 14, 2010]:

U.S. State Department to Replace Goblets

A dealer just asked me if I had read the latest issue of Glass Shards, the newsletter of the National American Glass Club. There is an article about Steuben Glass, the company’s problems and need to lay off workers because they have lost so much business in the economic down turn. On the next page is an article about Orrefors, the Swedish glass company. They were chosen for a $5.4 million contract from the U. S. State Department to make glasses for 400 American Embassies. Each glass will be engraved with the seal of the United States. Critics are furious that the government did not keep the jobs at home with a company founded in 1903. We just learned that the U.S. Senator from New York has asked that the glass contract be rebid so that a U.S. company will be considered. But there is also another reason to have U.S. made products used. Our embassies, as representatives of our country, should be furnished with the best the United States can produce–a way to brag about the quality of U.S. products